


Maybe We Should Have Gone Out for Pizza First.

by Misscar



Series: The Idiot's Guide to Multi-species Polyamorous Relationships [2]
Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Allusions to previous non-con, Angst and Humor, BAMF Uhura, Couch Sex, Dirty Talk, F/M, First Time, Fluff and Humor, Foreplay, Hand Jobs, Jim needs a hug or BJ, Kelvin Timeline, Living Together, M/M, Multi, New Relationship, Polyamory, Post temporary character death, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, Science Kink, Sexual Content, Sexual Humor, Sexual Tension, Threesome - F/M/M, post STID
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-19
Updated: 2014-03-29
Packaged: 2017-12-24 00:37:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 46,109
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/933055
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Misscar/pseuds/Misscar
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sequel to: Take a Third Option<br/>Series: The Idiots Guide to Multi-species Polyamorous Relationships <br/>Story summary: When it comes to dating (love, relationships, and/or talking about his feelings) Jim has no idea what he’s doing, but that has never stopped him. So it makes perfect sense that he dives right into the deep end of this relationship thing and moves in with Spock and Nyota four days after they decided that they all kind of love each other in that way. Did he mention they can’t have sex for the next eight weeks? This may end up body bag bad.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Step 10: Moving in Together (no one said he had to follow the guide in chronological order or at all)

**Author's Note:**

> Setting: This story/series takes place during the year between Jim getting out of the hospital post resurrection and Enterprise starting the five-year mission.  
> Canon compliancy: Probably more Canon compliant then anybody at Bad Robot would ever want to admit to. The moving makes more sense if you accept the fact that Spock is dating Jim and Nyota simultaneously. The only thing not canon compliant is that I decided that Chris should have a wife and Number One will have a very big role in the series. I have plans for her. In other words, the first two films did happen in this universe without alterations even if I really wanted to. (Why did they have to kill Chris off? Evil bastards.) Everything happened, which raises a lot of interesting questions.

 

Jim Kirk doesn’t date or do relationships. That’s not entirely true if you count that guy that Jim exclusively slept with for four months, from his perspective anyway. (Nyota also argues that he has been subconsciously dating Spock for about as long as they’ve known each other but he doesn’t count it if it’s subconscious.) It’s just that whenever he tries for something more than fucking around, it essentially blows up in his face and ever since he has been keeping things casual, especially after the wedding crazy med student incident. Jim now knows for a fact she was that friend Dr. Marcus was talking about when she thought it was a good idea to get dressed in front of him, most likely to get back at him for breaking her friend’s heart (that’s the only logical reason he can come up with for her stripping down to her underwear in front of him).

Then Jim fell in love with his first officer, despite his better judgment and common sense. Jim just could not help it, even the scary brilliant girlfriend was not a complete deterrent. Okay, that was like a bonus feature that made Spock even hotter because Nyota is essentially everything he wants in a woman. She is brilliant, beautiful, assertive, and deadly. Considering that Spock is pretty much everything he likes in a guy, it was only natural that Jim started fantasizing about screwing (making love to) both at the same time. Of course, he mostly kept this to himself (except for that one time he suggested a threesome) because he didn’t want to completely fuck up their relationship or have to get a new first officer or chief communications officer because his baby comes first. Really, he wasn’t sure if there was anyone else in Starfleet that he could work with so well.

Then he died and the beautifully brilliant Nyota came to the wonderful conclusion that they should all just date each other. Before he died he was pretty much terrified of love and trying to do a stable ‘monogamous’ relationship. Okay, it was more like he was afraid to risk his friendship and working relationship with either individual considering his disastrous track record. Although, after you die in a warp core, really nothing should terrify you anymore. So after some convincing from Nyota and Spock, he decided to give the dating thing a try. (Spock’s mouth could already get him to do just about anything and they’ve only shared a few kisses of the Disney movie variety.)

The problem is he is not entirely sure what dating actually involves. Most of his past relationships pretty much consist of sex and--just sex. Thanks to evil Doctor Cockblocker a.k.a. Bones, that’s pretty much off the table until May because of his delicate health. He’s pretty sure that food and movies should be involved, but that really didn’t seem all that different than the activities that he engaged in with Spock and Nyota in the past. He would ask Chris, who would be laughing hysterically at the situation, but his mentor is gone. Chris’ overly logical wife, the brand-new boss Admiral Nhi (that’s not her real first name, but nobody knows her actual first name that is still alive) Pike, suggested dinner before she ended up throwing up in his bathroom when she came by to talk to him about memorial plans and everything that led to him being in the hospital in the first place.

Nhi is the only one in Starfleet that knows that he is dating his first officer and chief communications officer and she is actually happy about it. It was like the only thing that made her smile, although he blamed the throwing up. (Jim personally blames her probably developing bulimia right now on the fact that the admiralty decided it was a good idea to make her one of them before she had time to metaphorically bury her husband).

Jim, Spock, and Nyota were already way too busy being questioned two dozen times every single day about everything that went wrong to deal with filling out the proper paperwork to declare their relationship. Also, he doesn’t want the committee investigating to think that their personal feelings for each other influenced their actions during the crisis. Anyone with half a brain would know that, thankfully most Starfleet bureaucrats were morons. The only sane and intelligent ones (still alive) were Richard Barnett and Nhi.

At the moment, dinner consists of Nyota sneaking in edible soups and talking about the investigation as Spock holds his hand the entire time. Jim really doesn’t count the hospital dinners as actual dating. Because, first, it did not seem that different from how they hung out with each other before they acknowledged that they liked each other except now there is actual kissing involved whenever Bones and ‘scary nurse’ are nowhere to be seen. Two, a first date should never happen in a hospital after a near (actual) death experience. Three, how can it be a date when half the crew keep showing up at all hours and they have to go back to keeping the appropriate ‘really we’re just friends’ distance? (Considering the cursing and exchange of money that he saw between his chief engineer and navigator, no one was buying that).

After five days and one disastrous visit with the therapist/former hook up where Jim somehow manages to answer every question with a yes or no, Bones finally allows Jim to leave the hospital. There’s just one catch, he can’t be alone. Now, he could stay with Bones, but that would just be disastrous and way too much like that first semester where they tried to be roommates. It probably would work out better now that he wouldn’t be bringing strangers over at all hours for-- well sex. However, he does have a boyfriend and girlfriend and he would at least like to have a nice make out session without Bones making some smartass remark. That will not happen if he stays with the grumpy Doctor.

Now Spock, the beautiful logical one, suggests that Jim stay with him. Jim has this feeling that even if he and Spock were still dancing around each other, Spock would still insist that Jim stay with him during his recovery. It was the most logical option considering Spock lived in a four bedroom, 3 ½ bath loft near Embassy Row. The house belonged to Spock’s mother and was where the couple stayed when they were on planet because she hated the embassy. After her death, the house went to Spock. However, his father did occupy the house whenever his diplomatic dealings brought him to the planet.

Nyota is already living there because it was illogical for her to find housing elsewhere. Because Spock has the space for an extended houseguest, it just makes sense for Jim to stay with him during his post ‘warp core incident’ recovery. The difference is there is no pretense that Jim is going to actually leave afterwards, even if Bones said he had to have his own bedroom. So that’s how Jim ends up living with his boyfriend and girlfriend before dating and sex.

“This is not an apartment,” Jim says as he walks into Spock’s home with high ceilings and Vulcan artifacts on every surface. The now rare pieces of memorabilia are probably worth thousands of credits on their own. It is beautiful. Jim wonders exactly how wealthy his husband’s family really was considering this was just their ‘vacation home’.

“I believe technically it is a loft,” Spock answers simply as he shuts the door. Jim’s response is a quick squeeze of his hand as Nyota just rolls her eyes.

“That’s not what I mean. This is huge. I’m used to a tiny efficiency, with shady furniture, and questionable vermin running around. This place is beautiful,” Jim says, resting on one of the couches. He may be out of the hospital, but he just got out of the hospital after dying. The walk inside the building was exhausting.

“Starfleet facilities are usually fumigated,” Spock quips.

“You obviously never lived in the dorms,” Jim quips back. There was an incident in his second year involving somebody accidentally bringing a species of something cockroach like from another planet that pretty much took over the entire building. Then there was that incident during his third year involving tribbles that he doesn’t want to think about. He guesses he should be more tribble friendly considering one saved his life.

“Even though I was no longer on speaking terms with my father at the time, he insisted that I live here during my time at the Academy.”

For a moment, Jim wonders what it would be like if he had parents that actually cared. He did have Pike, but the closest thing he ever had to a dad is now gone too. Spock did not always get along with his dad, but it was obvious the guy cared in a very Vulcan way. Jim never really had that even before the men in white coats took his mom away.

 “Okay, recently I’ve lived in nicer places but there was a point where I pretty much drifted from couch to couch and had no home of my own. Not much has changed,” Jim adds darkly.

“You will not be sleeping on the couch. You will be in the master bedroom.” Spock does not add the desired ‘with us’ because he will be sleeping alone for the immediate future because Bones only agreed to this arrangement if Jim received his own bedroom. Stupid cockblocker doctor. If Bones ever gets the balls to ask Doctor Marcus on a date, Jim’s planning on crashing just to get him back. (Jim’s pretty sure the blonde weapons expert was there at the hospital to see the good doctor and not him, especially in light of the med student incident.)

“I didn’t mean that literally. I know it’s different this time.” Except he really does not because Nyota already lives there and a part of Jim feels that by being there he is an interloper in their relationship and not an equal part in whatever this thing is. He is certain he is going to screw everything up just by his presence. This is why he doesn’t do relationships or emotions.

“You’re talking about ending up in foster care after your mom ended up at the clinic?” Nyota asked referring to his mom’s institutionalization as ‘the clinic’. He falls just a little bit more in love with her for that. Maybe he falls more in love with her because she looks at him with the same reverence that she normally reserves for Spock. More importantly there was no pity in her gaze.

“Pretty much,” Jim says as he feels two different sets of arms wrap around him, instantly easing his earlier fears. “I really haven’t had a home since before what happened on that planet that I do not speak of, unless you count Enterprise. I almost did but both of you know how badly that went,” he says, remembering that wonderful year where he thought maybe he could have a family again.

“Enterprise counts,” Nyota tells him before he frowns again at the thought of the disastrous shape his baby is in. Scotty sent him pictures, even though the guy was explicitly told by Admiral Nhi (because he’s never going to be able to call her Admiral Pike without the urge to cry or break something) and Spock not to. He almost cried when he saw the pictures and his heart rate spiked high enough that it sent Bones into the room (that may be because he threw the PADD against the wall afterwards). It’s going to take months to rebuild his baby and he is not even completely sure if he’s going to get her back.

“We’ll be back there soon and you will be her Captain again,” Nyota says, practically reading his mind as she gives him a gentle kiss on the lips. This time she tastes of strawberry lip gloss and a hint of salt.

“This is your home as well,” Spock tells him before taking him to the master suite hand in hand. Jim doesn’t quite believe it. There are little pieces of Nyota scattered throughout the apartment, and Jim expects to see all his meager possessions in a suitcase, thereby making it easy for him to leave when he is no longer wanted there.

Except that’s not the case, because pretty much everything from his room on Enterprise is currently mixed in with Spock and Nyota’s stuff in the master bedroom. He thinks it’s funny that Nyota has half of the very large walk-in closet to herself and he and Spock are sharing the other half. There is something kind of beautiful about their blue and gold uniforms mingling together. Even his dad’s collection of old books (the only personal items that Jim has really held onto over the last 26 years) are on a shelf in what appears to be the bedroom study area. It just makes perfect sense that Spock’s master bedroom would have a study area.

“I thought I was supposed to have my own room according to Doctor keep-your-hands-to-yourself?” Jim jokes, as he is pretty sure that both are planning on staying with him in this room.

"I have read multiple journal articles that suggest physical contact and attention can increase the speed of the healing process.” Spock punctuates this with what Jim knows to be a Vulcan kiss. It makes his fingers all tingly.

“These studies were about newborns right?” he asks with a raised eyebrow mimicking his boyfriend. He loves calling Spock that.

“The findings are still relevant.” That was Spock for ‘yes, but I don’t care and I am looking for any excuse to violate the stupid doctor’s orders’.

“Do you want to sleep alone?” Nyota asks, giving him a dark look.

“Not really,” he says with a lecherous grin.

“She meant sleep as a period of rest and not as a euphemism for sexual activity,” Spock corrects, but this just leads to Jim kissing him chastely on the lips before falling down on the bed to take a nap, because recovering from almost dying is exhausting and he is still a little stoned.

He wakes up an hour later from what he refers to as the watching Pike dying again dream that's suddenly becomes the himself dying again dream, to find two bodies holding him tightly as they whisper comforting words. Jim starts to think that there are some advantages to this relationship thing (i.e. not being alone with his warp core memories). Maybe he can do this. This can’t be any harder than coming back from the dead, right?

To be continued.

 

 

 


	2. Part two: Humans are Weird

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone who read or reviewed the last part. Thank you for all of your suggestions. Some were in line with what I was thinking but others brought up points that I did not consider. Some of the things will be incorporated throughout the narrative. Please keep your suggestions and reviews coming. They keep me in the creative zone.
> 
> So now that the movie is out digitally via iTunes and the such in the US I have re-watched certain scenes like 10 times and I discovered that my memory was a little faulty. In this story I have Nyota arriving to engineering in the middle the ‘warp core incident’ instead of at the end. I am going to keep it the way it is in the story for narrative purposes.
> 
> I ended up re-watching that scene so many times with the commentary on because I was trying to figure out if it was one of the writers or one of the producers that said something along the lines of that the true heart of both TOS and the new universe is “the love story and friendship between Jim and Spock and this scene was in service of that”. I still haven’t figured out which guy said it and I am usually really good at telling the difference between voices. I’m sure he did not mean it the way I wanted him to mean it but my mouth dropped open when I heard the words ‘love story” but hey you never know.
> 
> Also in response to an anonymous review and to those that have similar worries this is a three-way relationship. All parties are equal. Nyota is not just sharing Spock with Jim, she’s dating Jim too. The reason why she suggested this arrangement was because she also has feelings for Jim, she is just not entirely sure what they are.

 

* * *

 

_“The key to a successful relationship is the ability to understand the personal history and culture of your partner(s).”_

_Chapter 4 of The Idiot’s Guide to Multi-species Polyamorous Relationships, revised fifth edition_

She looks at Spock, eyes wide with complete shock at the casual way he just suggested that she move in with him permanently. It’s not even a suggestion; it’s already an assumed fact. After Vulcan was destroyed, she stayed with him and his father at their apartment. However, she stayed in one of the guest rooms, and her main purpose was to box up Amanda’s Earth wardrobe and to make sure that the two distraught yet refusing-to-be-emotional Vulcans actually ate something. Maybe she was also there because she couldn’t exactly take living in a campus apartment complex where all her neighbors were dead. She only returned after the sort of break up where Spock pretty much told her he was leaving her to make Vulcan babies and that was such a disaster that it led to the drunk incident that began to redefine her relationship with Jim. (Spock was not really breaking up with her but after the disaster that was her parents attempt at a long distance relationship she knew better. Of course, she didn’t explain that to Spock until he came back.)

She has slept over in his quarters a lot on Enterprise because his room was obviously bigger (and it was the only way she could make sure that he did basic things like eat or sleep during those first few weeks post-Amanda). But she had her own room where she would go when the urge to strangle Spock became overwhelming (at least once every three days and usually Jim was involved). Besides, it was against the rules because they were not married or a federationally recognized equivalent, and Spock loves his fucking rules to the point that he would die before breaking any of them. Stupid Vulcan upbringing.

For what was supposed to be a short stay on the planet she was just going to stay with Spock before making a quick trip to visit her aunt in Melbourne and her father in Pretoria along with stepmom number two a.k.a. the one who’s not a bitch. (Thankfully her captain mother was safely in another part of the galaxy and wasn’t around to be one of the people killed during the attack on Starfleet). She was planning on spending extra time with the woman who raised her because she was still furious at Spock for the volcano incident. Okay, she was so pissed off that she almost did stay in Starfleet housing, but Chris’s wife talked her out of it. (Thanks to madmen that keep killing off her friends, the Admiral is one of the few female friends she has. She was a friend of Nyota’s mom and the actual aunt of her first roommate who left for mysterious reasons.) Then London happened and everything sort of fell apart.

To be honest she and Spock have been practically living by Jim’s bedside for the 14 days he was in a coma. Spock only slept in his bed one time during the 14 days and that was the night Leonard kicked both out and they engaged in certain activities (she rode him) until they both passed out. For the last four days that Jim has been conscious they have also spent the majority of their time at the hospital or at Starfleet headquarters dealing with idiots. If she had to recount what happened in the warp core one more time she is going to scream and possibly hit someone. Because of the chaos, she really didn’t have time to think about her living situation and Spock never asked her to leave (but he never really asked her to stay either).

Much to everyone’s surprise, thanks to the miracle ‘drug’, Jim is already up and walking around after only four days, if only for a few minutes at a time. Therefore, he was well enough to be released from the hospital (or maybe Doctor McCoy was just tired of walking in on the three making out). The only caveat is Jim cannot be by himself.

Spock suggests that Jim stay with him without even thinking. She’s not even surprised. Spock would have offered even if she didn’t call him out on his Jim-related feelings nearly 5 days earlier. It was a first officer’s job to look after the well-being of his ~~Jim~~ Captain. However, from the way he said it and the other arrangements that he is making, she just knows that Spock is not just moving Jim in until he got better. Jim will be moving in permanently as Spock’s boyfriend. A part of her is a little upset because he never asked her. She may have said something about that she shouldn’t. Spock just gives her his customary ‘you are a stupid human’ look.

“Why would I ask you to move in with me when you already reside there?” Spock asks with the same slightly put upon expression.

“I’m just a temporary guest like when I lived with my dad when he was married to stepmom number one. However, this is going to be permanent for Jim because I know you,” she tells him. “You even contacted Scotty to pack up Jim’s things and ship them down. I think you only gave me my own entry code because you were spending so much time here.”

“I apologize for not clarifying the situation. I thought that when I asked you to stay with me that you realized this was not a temporary situation.” At Spock’s words she replays that conversation in her head. The word temporary was never used. Actually, Spock said nothing that would lead her to assume that she was just a guest in his home. He even took her to that specialty grocery store that sells all her favorite junk food from where she grew up, and the pantry is filled with the stuff. He even adjusted the climate settings to ‘human friendly’.

“Humans are illogical sometimes,” she says with half a smile. “Moving in together is a big thing. It makes things more permanent. It’s harder to break up when all your stuff is at the other individual’s house. Maybe it hurt me a little to think that you were ready to take that step with Jim and not with me. You never really asked me if we should live together. You just told me it would be more logical for me to stay with you instead of procuring housing elsewhere during our time on earth,” she says, paraphrasing what he said.

“It is more logical for us to cohabitate instead of occupying separate residences because I calculate we would be spending 74.3% of our free time together if not for the current crisis.” Nyota smiles at his words before he continues.

“It is most logical for James to also cohabitate with us since it is not advisable for him to live alone during his recovery. Cohabitation is also logical because of the lack of leisure time due to the current crisis. For us to build a solid relationship it is logical that we spend time together.” She is pretty sure that is Spock’s speak for ‘if we do not live together we may never see each other for the foreseeable future’. She gets that point and in all honesty she’s pretty sure Spock would be spending the majority of their leisure time with Jim if he wasn’t staying with her and Spock.

He did before they decided to put a label on whatever was going on between the three. Actually, it’sbetter now because she is invited to sit in on their chess matches and Spock is there for the binge watching of obscure 21st-century films that require subtitles. She’s pretty sure Jim is solely responsible for convincing Spock that it’s a great idea to make out human style during the movie because Spock normally prefers the subtlety of Vulcan kisses.

“I know. Humans are illogical and unlike you, I can’t read your mind. You don’t have to tell me how you feel because it’s a good day when you acknowledge that you feel anything at all,” she says sarcastically.

“Although my regard for you and James is different in its nature, it does not differ in intensity.”

Her response is to kiss him. He hates public kissing and usually only allows it after near-death experiences or, okay, pretty much only after near-death experiences. They are in the corridor outside of James hospital room, and yet he does not stop her.

“I can’t believe we are doing this so out of sequence,” she mumbled against his lips. “It’s traditional to do pizza or something like that first.”

“Are you not the one who said that James and I have been technically dating for the last six months?” Spock asks, giving her the ‘humans are crazy’ look.

“More like from the moment you to saw each other,” she mumbles under her breath.  “It doesn’t count as dating if the two parties refuse to acknowledge that they are dating.” Spock actually raises an eyebrow at her words.

“Also, Doctor McCoy has requested that James has his own bedroom and does not reside with us in the same room.” She actually overheard Leonard’s exact words which were, “Fine, I’ll go along with your crazy little scheme to keep your honey bear close, if Jim gets his own damn room. I don’t trust Jim to be alone in a bed with two people he is attracted to and not do something. Hell, I don’t even trust you. Your logic goes out the window when he is around.”

“That’s not going to work. Even if it’s doctors’ orders, Jim is just going to feel like a guest and interloper in our relationship and not an equal partner. We need to make Jim feel welcome. You know about my family. After the divorce, it always felt like I was a guest in my stepmother’s home. I was the other kid from the first marriage that fell apart who kept everything in her suitcase because it would make it that much easier to leave when they didn’t want me anymore, and I know stepmom number one never wanted me there. I don’t want Jim to feel that way.” One unwanted tear slid down her cheek as she spoke.

“I will never fully understand humans.” His words are softened by a caress of his fingers against her cheek.

“You’re dating two of us; you’re going to have to eventually.” She smiles back at him. “When you are meeting with the admiralty this afternoon I will go back and get everything ready. Sulu and some others from Enterprise are supposed to be coming by this afternoon anyway to keep him company.” She adds that last part to make sure Spock knows that Jim will not be at the hospital alone.

“I defer to your judgment in all things human.”

“Good answer,” she says with a brush of her fingers against his.

Xxxx

She’s kind of surprised to realize how much of her things are already at Spock’s house (she should refer to it as “our house” but she’s not quite there yet). There are feminine hygiene products in the bathroom that are obviously hers along with her shoes that are spread out in various rooms throughout the large apartment. It is a very large apartment complete with a meditation room and exercise suite. The building also has a pool and a rooftop rose garden (that the others in the building have dedicated to Amanda).

Her favorite foods and wine are in the fridge and pantry. There’s even some left over pepperoni pizza in the refrigerator that she is so not going to be able to eat in front of her boyfriend. Surprisingly, even some of her clothing has already made it into the master closet. Okay, the majority of her clothing has already made it into the master closet. There are even pictures of her family up in the apartment including one of her, Spock, and her mother at the most depressing graduation ceremony ever.

There are a few images in the bedroom of her, Jim, and Spock at the winter seasonal party that occurred right before the lizard girl incident. Actually, if she did the math correctly, the lizard girl incident happened on Jim’s birthday, which puts the entire disaster in a new context. Really, she should’ve realized there was something going on between Jim and Spock from the ‘do not wish the Captain a happy birthday’ memo that went out.

Actually, what surprises her more than the fact that she already has such a distinct presence in this apartment is how little Jim has that is not Starfleet issued. There were about 15 old novels that were worth thousands of credits each, an old set of car keys, a few old toys, and a couple of sets of civilian clothes. Okay, there was also a massive sex toy collection that was tossed. It wasn’t even her that got rid of everything; it was Spock, who gave her an explanation that had her giggling for at least 15 minutes after he promised to replace everything. (Vulcans are never jealous, never.)

She quickly unpacks everything and places Jim’s books on the bedroom bookshelf. She also changes the sheets in practically every room in the house because real cotton causes Jim to break out in hives. Actually, she spends the better part of the afternoon allergy proofing the house. Her aunt’s allergies were just as bad as Jim’s, so she knows what to look for. At least a third of the stuff in the fridge is tossed in the trash because they contain soy, peanuts, or any number of fruits that Jim is allergic to. Apples are one of the few fruits he can eat without going into anaphylaxis. She even emails Dr. McCoy to write her a couple of prescriptions for anti-allergy hypos. They almost lost Jim to the warp core incident; she’s not losing him to peanut oil. She can’t watch him lifeless again, she just can’t.

She knows she’s the one who has to make this work, and making Jim feel welcome is a big part of that, even if that probably means no more of her favorite blueberry passion yogurt. Jim and Spock’s relationship with each other is all-consuming, and if this triad falls apart, she knows that she is the one who will lose everything. That’s not an option. She doesn’t want to lose Spock, but she’s realizing she really doesn’t want to lose Jim either. She doesn’t know how he did it, but the prick somehow managed to work his way into her heart, too.

She knows she did the right thing when she sees how happy Jim is when he walks into their master bedroom and sees that his things are not still in a suitcase or pushed to the side. He’s happy that he’s not sleeping alone when he wakes up from another nightmare. She knows it’s a nightmare even though he will not say anything about it. Spock knows that too. Jim falls back asleep when Spock presses his lips to Jim’s neck as her hand is pressed against Jim’s heart.

Spock has 100 messages that need to be sent out; most are questions for the record regarding that thing that they do not speak of or are about the rehabilitation of Enterprise. It has already been decided that Enterprise will be repaired instead of being scrapped although the decision regarding Jim being her Captain again will not come down until next week, maybe. Scrambling to get things as close to normal again as possible has taken precedence (although the decision about Enterprise made for a great cheer everybody up press release).

Instead of going into Starfleet, Spock stays in bed holding Jim against him and works from there. She stays in the room, but moves to the desk. She finds it funny that Spock has no trouble working on the bed but she needs a desk to function. She’s dealing with the same questions for the record Spock is. Unlike Spock, she’s also going to be taking over a few of the language classes when the Academy goes back in session next week for one of the professors that died. The woman had the misfortune of being at the wrong restaurant at the wrong time. Nyota’s new Admiral talked her into volunteering to do it because Enterprise would be grounded for at least six months and she didn’t want to get assigned to another ship in the interim. (Okay, she didn’t want a repeat of the reason why her parents divorced.) She was terrified that students who were practically her age (or older) would tear her apart in the classroom. 

She remembers firsthand what Spock went through with cocky students who didn’t respect him because of his age or heritage. She purposely kept her and Spock’s relationship quiet at the Academy because she did not want to undermine his authority by people thinking he was just another professor misusing his position by fucking a student. She is just going to have to get over her fear. Being here is more important than anything else, and teaching is her only option to be able to stay with Jim during his recovery and Spock as he oversees the rebuilding of Enterprise (although she is sure that their new Admiral will convince Jim and Spock to return to the Academy eventually).

During her work she occasionally looks up to see Spock with his hands against Jim’s heart. She wonders if Spock has to continually remind himself that Jim did come back to them (she knows she did). They fit together like puzzle pieces. She also must confess to herself that she enjoys watching the make out session that ensues after Jim wakes up. Much to her own personal disappointment, she actually has to remind _Spock_ that he needs to keep his hands above Jim’s waist for at least 55 more days. (Actually, they are all keeping their hands to their selves until Jim is cleared for ‘strenuous physical activity’. She and Spock decided it wouldn’t be fair to have sex with each other in front of Jim when he couldn’t participate.)

Spock cooks dinner as she and Jim watch movies in the living room. The movie is basically one of the few animated Disney films that does not involve parents dying in the most dramatic way possible. Spock is the designated chef in their relationship because the only thing she knows how to cook is grilled cheese and then it still comes out extra ‘crispy’. Thankfully, Spock can cook even if his repertoire is vegetarian. Jim is happy to eat anything that is not soup even if it is just lentils, brown rice, and steamed vegetables.

He is just as happy the next morning with a goat cheese and spinach omelet with honey butter croissants that Spock prepared before his 8 AM meeting with Admiral Pike (it will be years before she can think of that admiral without thinking of her deceased husband first). She is just happy Jim only woke up one time during the night and she’s not even entirely sure it was because of the nightmares because Jim kicked off the covers and removed his T-shirt before going back to sleep.

She ended up sleeping in between Jim and Spock last night. It made sense due to the fact Spock is a cover hog because he’s always freezing as a result of his lower body temperature* and Jim and she will be kicking everything off by morning anyway. They were still trying to figure out the happy medium between Vulcan comfortable and human comfortable that they can live with because there is no way she’s going to go with Amanda’s solution of having a separate bedroom or having Spock sleep in something similar to what he wears on the bridge. She likes her Spock with as little on as possible thank you very much.

“Okay, I think I now understand the real reason why you sleep in boy shorts and a tank top that looks more like a bra. The room was stifling and Spock was still cuddled under three blankets.” Jim says taking another tentative bite of his omelet.

“It wasn’t that bad. You’re still not completely well. We still need to figure out that happy medium between Vulcan comfortable and human comfortable. Apparently, Amanda never found that and slept in her own bedroom,” Nyota quips.

“Okay that explains why Spock was convinced his dad didn’t love his mom,” Jim mumbles. “Didn’t you guys figure this stuff out before I got here and completely fucked up your happy dynamic?”

“First, although I spent a lot of time in Spock’s quarters we never lived together,” she says, correcting Jim’s erroneous assumption.

“Because that’s against some obscure ridiculous regulation that only Spock remembers and I would have overlooked anyway but our favorite Vulcan must follow anyway because he’s an asshole like that,” Jim says with just a tiny bit of bitterness.

“You know Spock so well. I also wanted to avoid any more rumors. Half of the crew already thinks that I became chief communications officer at 25 only due to my excellent ‘oral skills’ and I’m not talking about linguistics.” The nasty glances and rumors were pretty harsh until their first mission where her ability to speak the language saved several crewmembers from being killed. She is sure that when things go public with Jim, it’s going to start all over again.

“Give me their names and I will take care of it,” he tells her with fire in his eyes. He is beyond pissed.

 

“If I didn’t give the names to Spock, I’m not going to tell you. It’s over.” What was left unspoken was ‘some people in command are already questioning some of your Spock-based decisions and I do not want to give the ‘idiots that be’ or the crew another reason to question your leadership abilities’. Also, she’s pretty sure that at least two of those individuals died during the incident that they do not speak of.

“Okay. But seriously, you guys never lived together even before the start of the mission? You guys have been together for a while,” Jim asks, kind of in shock. She guesses that nearly 3 years seems like a long time to a guy that hasn’t had a relationship that has lasted longer than four months.

“Not really. The closest were those first few weeks after Vulcan was destroyed. It was mostly…” She started but was unable to finish.

“To keep Spock from self-destructing and to not be in the dorms,” Jim supplies for her.

“Pretty much,”

“I guess that means we’re on equal footing,” Jim says, not making eye contact.

“Spock is in love with both of us. I’m not just ‘sharing’ Spock with you, I’m dating you too because I like you, maybe even more than that but I’m still trying to figure that out. You haven’t cracked our relationship. You’re more like the glue holding everything together. I want you to feel like you belong here. That’s why I let you and Sulu hang out alone two days ago as I set everything up,” she says as she grabs his hand.

“You’re the one who unpacked everything.” He says kind of surprise.

Mostly, although Spock was the one who got rid of your ‘toy’ collection, citing that it was unhygienic to use previously used items and that you were medically not allowed to engage in activities that required those devices for the foreseeable future.” Jim’s response is to laugh at her words.

“Does he always try to justify his jealousy with logic?” Jim asks, rubbing his temple.

“Pretty much. He also says he was going to replace everything.”

“Oh yes, he will be replacing everything. As soon as I can walk more than 20 meters without getting winded, I’m taking Spock to the nearest sex shop, so he can replace everything in person.” She responds to Jim’s comment with a smile before he continues. “Thank you for trying to make me feel like I actually belong here.”

“You’re welcome. I know what it’s like to not feel like you really have a home even if I never ended up in foster care,” she explains to Jim. Of course if it wasn’t for Aunt Sarah, she is sure it could have been a possibility.

“My dad left Starfleet after the organization started to drift away from exploration and started becoming more militarized post-Kelvin-incident to take a job with the Nelson Mandela Foundation for Interplanetary Peace. It stopped being the Starfleet he loved, so he left and decided to find a job that better reflected his values, but my mom stayed. She felt like she had to stay in Starfleet because her best friend was one of the people that did not survive the Kelvin incident,” she starts to explain.

“Sorry.”

“It wasn’t your fault. They tried the long distance thing for a few years, but it got harder as my mom kept rising through the ranks. My mom became a captain and my dad became a cheater.” She spat the last part out with bitterness.

"I think I would’ve remembered a Captain Uhura," Jim says, trying to add levity.

"It’s Captain Oddoye. She went back to her maiden name post-divorce. My dad got remarried to the mistress, and I felt like an unwanted guest in her house. She hated me. I was relegated to the guest room that I was never allowed to redecorate and mostly forgotten about. But it was different at my Aunt Sarah’s house. I had my own bedroom that she redecorated just for me. I felt like somebody wanted me again and I wanted you to have that, which is why I spent the better part of a day allergy proofing.”

“It was really nice not breaking out in hives from the sheets,” Jim quips before getting serious. "I’m sorry you had to go through that. You have an Aunt Sarah?”

"She is not my biological aunt. She is my mom’s friend and the widow of the friend that died during the Kelvin incident. We always lived with her when my mom was planet side post-divorce, and when she realized how evil stepmom number one was, she opened her door to me permanently. It was a better alternative than the boarding school stepmom number one wanted to send me to,” she tells Jim, trying to not get lost in her memories of that time.

“I wish I had someone like that,” Jim mumbles under his breath, most likely referring to his first stepdad.

“I wish you did too,” she says, squeezing his hand.

“Why do parents not realize that they’re bringing complete ass holes into the lives of their children?”

"I don’t know about your mom, but my dad was too blinded by love to see it until she did to him what he did to my mom. Fortunately, stepmom number two is a decent individual, and my half-sister does not feel like a refugee in her own home. I hate talking about this,” she says, trying to repress her feelings about it.

“But I’m glad you did.” Jim says as he places a gentle kiss on her mouth. He tastes like honey from the croissants, and his mouth is warm against hers. It is different than what she is used to, but she is enjoying it.

To be continued.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *It is canon for Vulcans to have a lower body temperature than humans. For pure comedy potential, I’m going with that.


	3. Vulcans do not date (and there is probably a logical reason for that.)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The key to a successful long-term relationship is to spend quality time with your partner(s) getting to know him or her as an individual.
> 
>  
> 
> Chapter 2 of The Idiot’s Guide to Multi-species Polyamorous Relationships, revised fifth edition

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everybody who read or reviewed the last chapter. Remember reviews make me wake up at 5 AM before work to work on these stories that you love so much. Reviews make me happy and a happy writer is a productive writer.
> 
>  
> 
> I’m sorry it took so long to get this chapter up. I had some trouble getting it betaed and you don’t want to see what an un-proofread chapter looks like. It’s not pretty. Fortunately, GraysonSteele volunteered to look over this chapter. Thank you.
> 
>  
> 
> There will be a bit of a time jump in this chapter, because I would like to avoid repeating the mistake of needing 100,000 words to cover about two months.

The key to a successful long-term relationship is to spend quality time with your partner(s) getting to know him or her as an individual.

 

Chapter 2 of The Idiot’s Guide to Multi-species Polyamorous Relationships, revised fifth edition

 

* * *

 

There is not an equivalent to the word “dating” in the Vulcan language. It is not a concept in Vulcan culture as arranged marriages were the norm (at least it was pre-destruction of Vulcan). Children as young as seven would be bonded supposedly to the person he or she is most mentally compatible with. Spock has since learned that the matches were more about political grandstanding than actual mental compatibility. At least post destruction of Vulcan, they have given up this pretense and have conceded that most bondings are now about repopulation and the survival of the species, which is why polyamorous relationships are becoming more common in Vulcan society.

 

Of course, Spock had always doubted that mental compatibility was the true reason for most matches. He doubted that anyone would have tried to match him with such a bigoted Vulcan who referred to his mother as a whore and saw Spock as lesser simply because of his human heritage, if actual mental compatibility were a factor. The only thing he had in common with the particular individual he was supposed to bond with was that they were both Vulcan and even that was debatable because he is half human. The irony that he actually follows Vulcan philosophy in practice and not merely in word, unlike her, was not lost on him.

Despite her wealthy upbringing, T’Pring had various xenophobic tendencies and had called him several derogatory slurs in Vulcan upon their meeting at age 14. Basically, the only individuals whom he had met that were even more unpleasant were entirely responsible for destroying the planet of his birth and causing his mother’s death or responsible for destroying a large portion of San Francisco killing hundreds including Admiral Pike and his James.

Thankfully, he never actually joined his mind to T'Pring's. Increased distrust of the Vulcan population occurred after inaccurate initial reports blamed the destruction of the USS Kelvin on the Vulcan people. Because his father’s diplomatic skills were in great demand, Spock's family spent the majority of his early childhood off planet.  This was why his family acquired a residence on Earth. Therefore, he was not able to bond with T’Pring at age 7, as was traditional. He doubted she would have been so bold, at 7 to openly display her disdain at the possibility of being bonded to somebody who was ‘contaminated with inferior human blood’. However, at 14, she had no trouble expressing said sentiments.

 

Apparently, she assumed that because he spent a great deal of his childhood on other planets his ability to speak Vulcan was inferior and therefore it would be the perfect language to insult him and his mother in. However, both he and his mother were perfectly proficient in the language. His mother was not pleased.

 

Amanda’s response was to walk up to his father and tell him in perfectly accented Vulcan, “If you force my son to join his mind to this daughter of illogic and hatred, you will be the one who will have no one for your time. My child will be free to love who he wants.” It was only as an adult that he understood exactly with what she had threatened his father. Because of her, Spock was free to choose his own bond mate.

        

However, thanks to his mother's intervention, he had no choice but to explore the human concept of dating especially as he needed to find a bond mate in the event that certain biological issues press the matter. Dating on Vulcan was an experience he wished to never repeat. Most interested in pursuing a relationship or rather establishing a bond with him were 3 to 4 times his age and only interested in him due to his family’s political connections or due to their own biological needs. He is thankful for his relationship with Nyota (and now James as well) that it keeps him from being subjected to his father’s repeated attempts to find him a suitable bond mate. Spock is certain that the Vulcan candidates would be even less appealing now.

 

His experiences with dating on Earth were largely unproductive and consisted primarily of blind dates set up by his mother, her friends, or his former commanding officer and his wife, also known as Admiral N. Pike. The most inconvenient part of this process was most of these individuals knew very little about Vulcan eating habits and they usually ended up at an Italian restaurant. During his time as a cadet, there had been a series of marginally successful dates with a colleague's niece. The situation became untenable when she became slightly obsessed with him after they engaged in certain intimate activities. At that point, Spock decided that dating was overrated. He had even contemplated agreeing to another prearranged bonding in case he was subjected to a certain biological condition.  Thankfully, he met Nyota before such a thing was absolutely necessary. Not surprisingly, Spock never wanted to dine at another Italian restaurant as long as he lived.

Although technically he and Nyota have been together for three years, he was uncertain if one could refer to it as dating by the standard definition. Due to the clandestine nature of the relationship at the Academy, they never engaged in activities such as going to movies or concerts after they formally became a couple. Before the relationship became non-platonic, they participated in a few group activities where their interactions were merely friendly, but even this seldom happened. And now that they were able to interact publicly, circumstances rarely allowed for such things.

“So you’ve never taken Nyota for a nice dinner or any type of dinner, just the two of you? Really?” Jim asks as they stopped for lunch on the way back from what was supposed to be his biweekly therapy session. James forced Spock to stop for pizza post session because he said it was something that they needed to do for the sake of having a healthy relationship. When Spock pointed out his disdain for Italian food in general, Jim pointed out that this was California style pizza and the place had eggplant veggie burgers on the menu as well. Spock did not understand the human obsession with a “pizza date”, but he conceded anyway. Nyota mentioned something similar when they were discussing her and James moving into his house.

 

Thankfully, the press that wanted to know more details about the incident involving the Vengeance and Enterprise’s role in the entire episode were nowhere near the restaurant. The fact that they had purposefully dressed in civilian attire was probably a contributing factor in not being followed or accosted. The press had mostly been stationed outside of Starfleet Headquarters. Spock has only had to deal with their questions when there or at least that was the case until yesterday. They were starting to show up in other places, such as Starfleet Medical and the Academy. Spock felt certain that as soon as the press discovered where the trio lived they would begin lingering outside there as well.

The reporters were obviously getting dissatisfied with his response of some variation of “no comment” or simply raising an eyebrow at the reporters. He has no desire to answer any of the questions, especially those related to Jim. Spock had hoped that they would be satisfied with the official statement, but it was obvious they were not. Rumors about Jim’s death and subsequent resurrection were starting to circulate despite everyone’s attempts to keep a close hold on that information. It wasn’t even in the official report. He did not think James was ready for their questions either. This is the only reason he consented to wearing jeans and some sort of hat to cover his ears.

 

Spock chose to take the morning off to make sure James actually attended the session this time because he avoided the previous one claiming to be too fatigued to attend. (Spock was also there to make sure James was not accosted by the press when he arrived at Starfleet Medical.) His decision had nothing to do with the fact that Spock disliked the idea of James spending time with a former significant other, mostly because Jim despised spending time with the man. Spock doubted that the session was productive considering that it ended 39.4 minutes earlier than scheduled with James stomping out of the doctor’s office mumbling various expletives under breath.

 

Spock was attempting to discuss why James was so hostile towards this particular physician when James changed the subject to this.

“No. Although we were given permission to date by Starfleet, we felt it best to keep our relationship a secret to avoid all appearances of impropriety.” Spock explains.

 

Prior to the newly formed relationship, James had been aware that bond mates were necessary for Vulcan survival.  Spock had yet to tell him all the details, but he was certain that James has probably done some research of his own.

 

“And you didn’t think about using a very big hat and glasses to cover up your Vulcan-ness? The casual dress and baseball cap are doing a really good job at keeping the press away from us today.” Jim joked, which resulted in Spock raising a single eyebrow at him.

 

“Okay, I get that. God knows you’re obsessed with the rules, but I mean what about after graduation?” James asked with a hint of annoyance. They have not talked about the incident on Nibiru during the 11 days since James had regained consciousness. Actually, they have not discussed anything related to the reason why James was technically in a ‘coma’ for 14 days or why part of San Francisco will have to undergo massive reconstruction.

“Circumstances did not make things such as going to dinner to simply to exchange pleasantries a priority when we were on Earth post-graduation and there are not many opportunities to “date” once we were in space. Also, due to the fact that most perceive me as my girlfriend’s commanding officer, I felt it necessary for us to…”

“Avoid all appearances of nepotism and impropriety,” James finishes for him.

“Indeed,”

 

“Okay, I get that,” James says sympathetically. “How exactly do you get to know somebody if you don’t do the traditional dinner and movie thing? We are both aware of that when it comes to that part of things, I suck.”

 

“Just because Nyota and I did not interact in public does not mean that I did not get to know her. Her favorite color is green. Her parents divorced when she was 10. She is their only biological child together. However, she has two stepbrothers from her second stepmother and a half-sister from stepmother number one that she is relatively close to. Her first stepmother forced her to take ballet, even though she wanted to join the track team instead. She studied for five years, even after she moved in with her aunt Sarah in Melbourne. I tried to teach her how to cook once and she started a small fire.” James responded to Spock’s words by breaking into laughter.

 

“She actually started a fire?” James asks as he tries to control his laughter.

 

“Unfortunately, yes,” the incident triggered the apartment’s anti-fire system, but he would never tell Jim this. “She has refused to try cooking anything non-replicated beyond grilled cheese after that incident.”

 

“I had her grilled cheese the first lunch after getting out of the hospital. It was a little-- okay, you’re right. I can totally believe that she started a fire. I’ve been doing all the cooking when you have not been around ever since.” Spock almost said something about James not over exerting himself, but he felt it was in his best interest to keep quiet on the matter.

 

“She despises the standard female uniform, but wears it on the bridge any way to unnerve me.” He tells this to James as the man was currently producing the same effect in Spock by licking tomato sauce off his fingers.

 

“Does that actually work?” James asked as he takes another slice of pizza. Spock wants to say it works as well as a shirtless sparring match with him, but this is neither the time nor place to discuss such things.

 

“I choose not to answer that question in public.” Jim just laughs a little before smiling at him.

 

“Of course you don’t. Okay, Mr. Show off what do you know about me? You can’t use anything from my Starfleet dossier or that’s sort of public knowledge like my dad being really dead or the reason why my mom is in the clinic either because that’s cheating.” He says with a smirk, although Spock knew that James is really hiding his discomfort. James dislikes discussing anything related to his father sacrifice, his unfortunate stepfathers, or anything related to the circumstances of his mother’s long-term hospitalization.

“I would never cheat but you would.” Spock says picking up a spear of fried zucchini with a fork. At least he can eat this without Jim laughing at him for using a utensil. It was also one of the few things that he liked at this particular restaurant along with their minestrone soup that Jim was not allergic to.

 

“That wasn’t cheating, it was changing the parameters.” Jim said defensively swiping some of Spock’s zucchini.

 

“You changed the parameters because you despise situations where there are no other options,” Spock says giving in and decides to try a slice of pizza, even if he will be criticized later for using a knife and fork.

“At least you say that as if it’s not a bad thing anymore,”

“If you gave up easily you would not be with me right now and I find that thought less than pleasant.” Watching Jim die was the most excruciating experience of his life and he wishes never to repeat it.

 

“You really do like me.” James said, giving Spock a quick kiss on the lips. Normally, he disapproved of public displays of affection, but Jim needs to know that he is important to Spock and allows the gesture. Also, Jim’s mere presence makes Spock forget that such a gesture is inadvisable when they are being sought out by the press for additional answers about the ‘Vengeance incident’.

 

“Okay, so what else do you know about me?” Jim asked now practically bouncing in the booth.

 

“You have a brother who is four years older than you but you have not spoken to him since your enlistment in Starfleet. He did not come to see you when you were incapacitated despite Nyota threatening him with extreme bodily harm if he did not visit you.” James just gives him a sad smile at that.

 

“I’m not surprised. He never visits mom. He’s too busy with the girlfriend and their son. He didn’t even call me to tell me that I was going to be an uncle, Arlene did. Okay, can we please switch to non-angst inducing things that you know about me? “What’s my favorite color” and that sort of thing.” Jim prompts in an effort to avoid anything of an extremely sensitive nature.

 

“Blue. You’re obsessed with music from what is referred to as the post-Eugenic Wars Renaissance, especially a group referred to as the Beastie Boys*. You have their entire catalog on vinyl and this was the one actual personal thing you retrieved from the apartment you were staying in previously.” They collected the remainder of Jim’s things two days ago, once Jim was physically up to packing.

 

Spock glanced around the room displeased at the obvious signs that James engaged in sexual intercourse with someone else in that bed, recently. Or at least he was until James told him, “Don’t be so snippy about this. First, we were not together at the time because you have a girlfriend who I’m sure you would have been having sex with if she had been speaking to you at the time. Second, eventhough I was in the middle of a threesome, I still had to think about you to get it up. Finally and most importantly of all, I stopped to pick up a call from you which pissed off my two “guests” enough that they left without a word. See, I was already in love with you to the point where I'd rather talk on the communicator with you then have a threesome with two random girls whose names I honestly don’t remember right now.”

 

Spock’s response was to kiss James in a way that almost led to the couple breaking Doctor McCoy’s prohibition on sexual intercourse. James was actually unzipping Spock’s pants when Mister Scott decided that moment was the most appropriate time to call James to inquire how he was doing.

 

“That’s only because you threw away my other stash of se...um toys.” Jim mumbles disrupting Spock's train of thought and causing the woman and small child sitting in the next booth to look at him strangely. “I am so expecting replacements.”

 

“Your favorite Shakespeare play is Much Ado about Nothing,” Spock began not addressing the sex toys comment. “Your favorite poem is _Mother to Son_. I have seen you reread it after many difficult missions. You wanted to order a meat lover supreme pizza, but did not want to offend me and therefore ordered spinach and feta.”

 

“That was mostly because I knew you would sneak a piece,” Jim said, pointing to Spock’s plate where he has cut the slice in to bite size pieces that he was now eating. “Also I’m not sure I can handle something like that after…” Jim trails off at that point, not wanting to discuss that thing they do not talk about.

 

“Okay, so maybe you know me and our mutual girlfriend better than a lot of people, but a lot of that stuff you know from  being really really observant. How do you learn the big stuff? I’m still completely lost here. Just sex relationships are so much easier and we can’t even do that right now,” Jim tells Spock with what Doctor McCoy refers to as the man’s ‘sad puppy dog eyes’.

 

“Indeed. In Vulcan society, your future bond mate is prearranged by your family supposedly based on “mental compatibility” and your minds are linked at a young age. However, my mother was against me undergoing this practice. Therefore, I was left to do things the human way. I am uncertain which method is superior.” He said, remembering Nyota’s unpleasant reaction when he tried to explain that he was not breaking up with her when he chose to leave Starfleet to help on the New Vulcan colony. Being in her mind would have been helpful at that point. That argument could’ve been avoided if he was aware of the circumstances behind her parents’ divorce. Despite things like this, James and Nyota were still much better companions than anyone on Vulcan he had introduced to for that purpose.

 

“That’s so cheating. Wait, did you and Nyota already do this mind linking thing?” James asked slightly alarmed. James was still under the wrong impression that his presence was disruptive to Spock and Nyota’s life. When in reality, it seems that James was the missing piece in their relationship. To ease his worry, Spock grabbed his hand (eliciting more strange looks from the woman at the neighboring table).

 

“No,” Spock says forcefully looking James directly in his eyes. As soon as the words are out of his mouth, a smile returns to James lips for just a second before he becomes pensive again.

 

“Is bonding even possible with humans? Is that why you guys are not linked are or whatever? I know mind melds are possible, but I’m guessing that’s different.” James asks.

 

“Yes, it is possible, although not always.” Spock neglects to tells James about the conversation he had with James’ psychologist after Jim left his session prematurely. The therapist believes that there is a good possibility that a spontaneous bond has formed between the two and it was the cause for Spock blacking out during the time that James was technically dead. However, Spock refuses to allow the physician to examine his mind. He is wary of any non-Vulcan attempting such an examination. Also, he doubts that James trusts the individual enough to look into his mind, considering what happened at the earlier session.

 

“Nyota and I have yet to discuss the possibility.” Actually, Spock has yet to check to see if such a mental bond would be possible. He wanted to at least introduce her to his parents before speaking to her about the possibility and consulting a mind healer. The destruction of Vulcan and meeting Jim completely changed his original plan and he has not had an opportunity to address the situation during the interim. Also, prior to meeting Spock Prime, he was not completely certain he would need a bond mate for medical reasons. Surprisingly, that was the one piece of information his other self was willing to divulge without preamble.

 

“But it’s something that you want to do with her, eventually?” Spock is instantly aware of the real question that James is asking, “At some point are you going to leave me to marry her?”

 

“Polyamorous marriage and bonds are recognized by the Federation. Polyamorous bonding in Vulcan society have become more common and is a possibility.” That statement seemed to alleviate some of Jim’s fears.

 

“Because for reasons that we don’t really want to discuss in 23rd century society more male Vulcans survived the destruction of Vulcan, than females,” Jim said flippantly as he finished the last of his pizza and Spock nodded in agreement as he prepared to leave.

 

“Okay, I think I’m starting to see why you see nothing wrong with us living together before the first date. In Vulcan terms, you are like an old spinster - still unbonded at the ripe old age of 29. You are so going to explain why Amanda did not want you to become a child bride when we get to the car.” Jim says as he gets up from the table now that both were done eating and Spock wordlessly follows him out of the restaurant. And yes, in the car James did get him to tell him the entire story of T’Pring. James was quite incensed by the Vulcan’s actions. He also referred to Amanda as a “bad ass.”

 

“As first dates go, I think this went pretty well.” James said, once they arrived back at the apartment and Spock nodded in agreement. “The lunch was quite pleasant.”

 

“Unfortunately for you, I can’t put out on the first date even if I want to.”

 

“That is disappointing.” Spock says with actual disappointment as he steps inside the empty apartment. Nyota is still at the Academy.

 

“However, I can do this.” Jim said as he pushes Spock against the nearest wall and proceeds to kiss him in a way that results in damage to a nearby lamp.

* * *

 

 

“It is like everything they learned during the first two months of class was forgotten during their unplanned hiatus. Seriously, how did you handle teaching first-year cadets without actually strangling anybody?” Nyota asks after he walks into her office. Since his meetings at Starfleet headquarters were done for the day, he decided to check up on Nyota. It was her third day teaching at the Academy and she was visibly frustrated.

 

“If you say ‘Frustration is not an emotion that I actually feel’ you are going to be sleeping on the couch for the foreseeable future.” She threatens. He decides his best course of action is to cut off any further communication by pressing his lips against hers. Thanks to James influence, Spock was starting to become more comfortable with public displays of affection, especially because in this case, public only consist of Nyota’s office mates. (It would only be later that he realized this was the same woman who gave him and James strange looks at the restaurant the day before.)

 

“I will say no such thing. Being able to spend my evenings with you helped settle my mind enough to allow me to deal with the students on a regular basis. Also, I actually did try to strangle James.” Her response is to laugh.

 

“I don't think you ever had him as a student, so it doesn't count. I think he kind of liked it, anyway. It would make perfect sense if Jim is into erotic asphyxiation. You saw some of the toys he had before you threw them away in a fit of jealousy.” She remarked.

 

“Why would someone find these types of activities stimulating?” He asked ignoring her remark about the toys, even if he already knows why someone would like something like that. He will never ever tell her about his physical reaction to having Jim beneath him in such a position.

 

“Jim is an adrenaline junkie. The thought of almost dying gets him off probably as much as the actual sex,” she tells him with an unreadable expression.

 

“It is my hope that actually dying will prevent that behavior from resurfacing.” She looks away from him at that moment. He broke the unspoken taboo of speaking about the ‘warp core incident’.

 

“Not that I don't enjoy your being here, but why are you here?” She asked after a moment.

 

“During lunch with James yesterday, I was made aware of the fact that I have never taken you out for a date. I thought we could so that we may partake of a meal together while in a public setting.” Spock tells her, but she just shakes her head.

 

“I appreciate the gesture, but you do not have to do a tit-for-tat thing. You and I have been together for three years. I think you should use this time for you and Jim to get to know each other beyond Captain and First Officer. I was kind of doing the same before I began teaching at the Academy. Did you know that, Jim can speak four languages fluently, not counting standard and pre-warp English? It turns out there really was a reason for him being in the xenolinguistics club, other than trying to get a date.” Spock did not know that. But what struck him at that moment is he was not entirely sure how many languages Nyota could currently speak fluently.

 

“I would still like to dine with you in a casual public setting. I am starting to become more aware that I do not know as much about you as I have previously assumed. For example, I am uncertain of the number of languages that you are proficient in currently.” She responded to his statement by laughing at him.

 

“Okay, maybe a lunch that’s not from the cafeteria will give me the strength to survive my 3 PM class without hurting someone. My office mate Shanti told me about this new Indian place a couple of blocks away that has a decent vegetarian menu,” she suggested.

 

“That is acceptable.” Spock told her.

 

Nyota quickly grabbed her jacket and purse before they left the office together. They chose to walk because the restaurant was only 4.2 blocks away. They went out a back exit and were not accosted by the press.

 

“Just because we’ve been together for a long time, doesn’t mean we’re going to know everything about each other. Although, knowing you, you probably think that you should. I still don’t completely understand why you act like things don’t upset you when I know that they do. I’m not sure that I ever will. We have time.” He is tempted to interject, but felt it was in his best interest not to speak.

 

“You really shouldn’t feel bad about the language thing because that number changes monthly. You know I’m always studying more languages.”

 

“That is true; however, I would still like to know the number.” She just smiles at him as they walk side-by-side. They do not hold hands. Although the relationship is now public knowledge and the gesture means something completely different on Earth. Spock is uncertain if he will ever be comfortable engaging in that type of physical contact in public.

 

“I’m probably proficient in about 10 languages, not counting standard and old English, in the sense I could carry on a conversation in those languages and not make a fool of myself or cause an interplanetary incident. There are several other languages that I can say the basics like ‘Please don’t shoot’ and ‘Really, he did not mean to sleep with your daughter’.” She had used that particular line 5.6 months ago.

 

“Hopefully, you will no longer need that particular phrase,” he said in the closest approximation of mumbling that he would ever allow himself.

 

“Honey, it wasn’t Jim who slept with the ambassador’s daughter; it was Sulu. The ambassador only attacked Jim because he was in charge and did not prevent the incident from happening. Funny, you had no trouble submitting a highly edited report for that incident to cover for Jim.” The last part was mumbled so low that he would not have been able to understand her without Vulcan hearing.

 

“You’re so cute when you’re jealous.” Spock felt it was in his best interest not to correct her erroneous assumption regarding his ability to show jealousy or the reason why he did not send in an altered report when such a thing would have been advantageous. Yes he highly regrets his misinterpretation of Admiral Pike’s words due to the long-term consequences, but there is nothing he can do about it now.

 

“There’s a few more languages that I can read but not speak. There are also a few languages that I used to know, but as they say, ‘If you don’t use it, you lose it’. I don’t even think I can carry on a conversation in Swahili with my paternal grandmother anymore, even though that was the language spoken most around me until the age of 10,” Nyota explain with a sad expression.

 

“How did that occur?” Spock asks because he realizes that it is more important that he knows the reason why she knows certain languages than knowing which languages she can actually speak.

 

“I’m going to blame that on living in Australia from 12 until 20. It’s easy to get rusty if you don’t practice.” She explained. He already knew that her teenage years were spent in Australia, but he never really examined what type of impact it had on her.

 

“In light of recent events, I suggest practicing your Klingon whenever possible,” he remarked, as they kept walking.

 

“I’m auditing a few of the Klingon classes for that reason. Maybe we should speak Vulcan at home sometimes; it will help me keep it straight from my other Vulcan-based languages. Jim speaks it too.” The suggestion is appealing to Spock. It reminds him of home, even if that particular home no longer exists. Not that he will ever confess to such a thing, but he misses speaking the language of his birth.

 

The Indian restaurant was one of the few near the Starfleet campus to have reopened. Because he wasn’t ready to talk about anything related to why many restaurants in the city are closed or destroyed, Spock decided to ask her more about growing up in Australia. This is not the first time he has broached this particular subject with her, it is just that she dislikes talking about her childhood, and it is usually very difficult for her to say anything about it. They were together for 14 months before he learned that she studied ballet for five years. This time he learned about her being a high school track star and she was happy that her mother actually made it back to Earth to see her compete nationally.

 

Their lunch date was proving quite productive for the couple until Admiral N. Pike arrived to the restaurant with her niece who was visiting. The Admiral approached Spock to let him know that several members of the Enterprise crew were planning a surprise ‘we are glad that you are back among the living’ party for Jim and they needed his cooperation to secure Jim's participation. Nyota was surprised when Spock grabbed her arm the moment that the Ensign came into view. After the Admiral and her niece left their table, he had no choice but to tell Nyota the reason for his behavior. To say she was unhappy to learn about his history with the young woman was an understatement. He was not relegated to sleep on the couch only because James slept more peacefully when they were in the bed with him. Unfortunately Jim's nightmares were becoming a regular occurrence. However, as long as Spock was physically touching him, Jim's sleep was undisturbed.

* * *

 

In the year that they have been acquainted, Spock has learned not to tell James something is impossible because he will try to do it anyway. This explains why, after several uncomfortable meetings at Starfleet, he returns home to find James trying to teach Nyota how to cook. Thankfully, Nyota has forgiven him for the incident involving the Admiral’s niece and therefore actually smiles at him.

 

“Okay, that zucchini is not a Klingon that you’re trying to stab to death. Actually, I think you would be better at that than this.” Nyota responds by glaring at him. “Okay, I probably shouldn’t say that when you’re holding a knife because I know you know how to use it for dismemberment, if not chopping vegetables. Here, hold the knife like this,” James says, placing her fingers on the knife. To Spock's surprise, she actually does manage to successfully slice the zucchini without blood loss.

 

“See, I told you that you could do this.” James rewarded her with an anything but chaste kiss on the mouth. The baking dish that was to contain the prepared zucchini was pushed aside, falling off the counter and shattering against the ceramic tile floor.

 

“I really don’t belong in the kitchen. This was how the fire started last time.” She explains as she begins to clean up the broken glass. Spock may have left that particular detail out of his recounting to James.

“Wait, seriously?” Jim asked arching an eyebrow.

 

“Oh, don’t let the calm Vulcan exterior fool you. He is just as up for kitchen sex as you are.” Nyota tells him punctuating her words with another kiss.

 

“Or would be if I wasn’t forced to be a good boy by Doctor cock blocker.” Jim says as he reluctantly pulls away from her. "Are you sure? I haven’t seen you guys do anything. I was starting to think, Spock was waiting until bonding or whatever.” Nyota response to Jim’s words with laughter.

 

“He wasn’t even a virgin when we got together. That honor went to my ex-roommate before she was actually my roommate.” Spock was thankful that her words were said with a smile and not irritation.

 

“Oh my god, you actually had sex with Gaila? I always knew Vulcans were not immune to her pheromones.” Jim said with a smirk.

 

“It was my first roommate, Christine, and it happened before she was even in Starfleet. She was just normal premed at the time. You know her too because she is-- was Pike’s niece. She transferred to London after the first year due to personal problems. I didn’t even know it was her until like two days ago.” Nyota says glaring at Spock.

 

She was not upset with him for engaging in sex with someone else before they were together. She was aware of that he was not a virgin and has engaged in sex previously with both males and females. She was upset that he did not feel comfortable recounting the details with her of an experience that was so bad that he considered another prearranged bonding.

 

“Blonde, psycho, and good at giving—“ James was cut off by Nyota’s glare.

 

“Finish that sentence and you will never find out how good I am at that. Spock, don’t even think about answering that question, or it will be much longer than May before you get reacquainted with my mouth,” Nyota says still glaring at both with arms crossed.

 

“That was not what I was going to say. I was going to bring up how she looks exactly like her aunt, except for the hair color. They do not act alike at all, but they look like they’re clones of each other. Maybe that’s because they grew up on totally different planets.” Jim said out loud. Looking directly at Spock, Jim mouthed the words ‘we are so talking about this later’.

“I can read lips. Do you two want to share the couch tonight?” She asks with a glare.

 

“Of course you can.” James mumbled under breath. “Hey, why are you cock blocking him when I’m the only one that has a medical restriction on fun time?” James asks.

 

“It would be inappropriate to engaged in sexual activities together when you cannot participate.” Spock answers.

 

“You don’t have to. I can still watch. Also, once I’m healthy enough for sex, do you really think I’m going to wait until all three of us have time to be in a room together?”

 

“No,” both she and Spock answered simultaneously knowing James too well. “However, I doubt right now that you can just watch and well I’m not going to risk you breaking doctor’s orders until you can get through cooking dinner without having to sit down.” Nyota adds.

 

“But that’s what handcuffs are for,” James retorted, which earns him glares from both.

 

“So you’re not doing anything because you don’t want me to be tempted to do something against doctor’s orders?” James asks for clarification

 

“Essentially, yes.” Spock response.

 

“That is just so you.” James says as he pulled Spock around to kiss him on the mouth. However, James pulls out of the kiss abruptly.

 

“I can’t feel my lips.” James says or at least attempted to say right as he fell into Spock’s arms. At that point, half of Jim’s face was swollen and he was have difficulties breathing.

 

“What did you eat?” She asks Spock while stabbing Jim with a hypo that she had in one of the kitchen cabinets for such an emergency.

Spock replied, “A veggie burger, a latte, and pretzels, but none of those contained anything that James is allergic to, I checked.” He did so precisely to avoid this situation. He was worried but thankfully the allergy hypo was keeping Jim’s airway open and his breathing was starting to be less labored.

 

“He’s probably develop new allergies because of what happened. Who knows what the radiation could have done to his immune system. Take Jim to the car and I will call Leonard to tell him to meet us at Starfleet Medical. I’m really getting tired of spending the night in the hospital.” So was Spock.

 

To be continued.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The end scene was inspired by something that actually happened to my cousin. She is seriously allergic to seafood, which is horrible because she lives on an island and it's like a major food group there. It’s so bad that if you touch a piece of fish than touch her she goes into anaphylaxis. One time her husband had sushi for lunch (without telling her) and he kissed her afterwards before remembering to use mouthwash. The result was a visit to the emergency room.
> 
>  
> 
> If you have your own horror stories feel free to share, I look for inspiration in the strangest places. I'm literally working on the next chapter right now, so your suggestions will help keep me productive.
> 
>  
> 
> Footnote: I’m going to be blending actual history and Star Trek history together into my own interpretation. However, to make everything work, some events or pieces of pop culture were created later in the Trek universe. This is fanfiction, so I reserve the right to play around and have fun.
> 
>  
> 
> Jim’s Beastie Boys collection cannot be complete because the song Intergalactic cannot exist in this dimension, even though I absolutely love it because of the blatant Star Trek reference below:
> 
>  
> 
> Your knees start shakin' and your fingers pop
> 
>  
> 
> Like a pinch on the neck from Mr. Spock


	4. Were you expecting glitter?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Not everyone will approve of your involvement in what is still perceived in many parts of the Federation as a nontraditional relationship. However, for your relationship to be successful you need to learn not to let the unenlightened and misinformed opinions of others influence you adversely. If they cannot respect your rights as an individual, then you have a right to not listen to their objections.
> 
> Chapter 5 of The Idiot's Guide to Multi-species Polyamorous Relationships, revised fifth edition

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everybody who read or reviewed the last chapter. Thank you for allergy stories. They were inspiring. However, I would love to hear some of your stories of dates gone wrong.
> 
> To make up for the long wait for the last chapter, I tried to get this chapter up much sooner. I actually started writing it before the previous chapter was posted. Your reviews influence some of the stuff in this chapter.

 

Jim likes to pretend that he doesn't care what other people think of him. With a childhood like his, it is kind of expected. It's not like he has a mom or a dad that could actually show up to praise him when he won an award or to chastise him when he does something utterly stupid like violate the Prime Directive to save his secret crush. The biggest reason why he didn't try in school until he figured out that good grades were the only way he was going to be able to afford a higher education was because there wasn't anybody around to tell him that he was doing a good job or really give him any encouragement at all. His attitude became why try if nobody cares. Jim eventually figured out that he had to try for himself, but that realization took a while.

Jim is well aware he has a crappy reputation. He doesn't care if people think that he's the ship slut or if Dr. Marcus believes that he is a complete asshole for sleeping with her friend and then forgetting her name (Okay, maybe that one is a bad example, especially since Carol may be dating his best friend really soon). He doesn't care if people can't decide if he is the second coming of his father or a complete disgrace to his father's memory. He doesn't care if there is a rumor circulating around Starfleet that at 25, he became the youngest captain in Starfleet history because he's good at "servicing the admiralty". (Maybe it stings a little bit that there was a new variation of this rumor which says that is the reason why his captaincy didn't even make it past the 12 month mark.)

This is not exactly a new assumption about him. Some ass in high school nominated him for 'Most likely to become a professional sex worker' for senior superlatives. Thankfully, his foster father prevented that from making it into the yearbook. However, he still got 'Most likely to get arrested' and 'Most likely to die of a sexually transmitted infection before 30'. If he gets his ship back, he is going to have so much fun at the class of 2250 reunion.

A lot of people have made a lot of stupid assumptions about him. He's used to it. Let's see, most people assume that he is a whore, a player, a ladies man with emphasis on the ladies part, the standard for the hyper masculine heterosexual, a guy who fucks farm animals, a dumb hick, uneducated, just a pretty face, a beneficiary of nepotism, and other things along those lines. Anybody who actually knows him would know those things are completely wrong or downright fictitious. The problem is most people don't know him. They just think that they do. It probably has something to do with being born in the neutral zone and having a good part of your childhood play out in the tabloids.

A good example of people who think that they know him, but freak out when he doesn't live up to their ridiculous expectations was his first Starfleet roommate, Cameron Abrams. The guy had it in his head that Jim was the ultimate ladies' man and pretty much lost it when he caught Jim going down on the psychology major.

"I didn't even know you were gay." Of course, he spluttered this after Jim's date got out of there as fast as possible, mostly because the idiot started throwing things. Also the way he said the word 'gay' he might as well have been using another derogatory synonym. This reaction was especially irritating because when the guy "accidentally" walked in on him doing something similar with two girls he was all high-fives and fist pumps. Jim can't stand the homophobic or the bigoted in general. As much as people try to pretend otherwise in this supposed age of tolerance, bigoted idiots still exist.

"I'm not per se. I'm xenosexual. You walked in on me going down on an individual of Betazoid ancestry." Jim told him with a smirk.

"He still had a dick." The guy spat out with disdain.

"Your point? I don't have a gender preference, so whatever." Jim told him with a shrug as he threw on a T-shirt.

"You know what I mean. You always have girls over and you don't look like somebody who is gay. You don't have the tendencies." At those words Jim looks at his roommate, as if the guy has suddenly grown tentacles or something. Really, Jim shouldn't be surprised, because the guy has a habit of saying derogatory things about their non-human classmates. Xenophobia and homophobia usually went hand-in-hand.

"What the hell does that even mean?" Jim asked in annoyance. Jim doesn't even give him time to respond because it was probably going to be something horribly stereo typical and highly ignorant. "Were you expecting glitter or maybe pink spandex?" The look the idiot was giving Jim pretty much told him that he was. "Did the fact that I'm good with a phaser throw you off? You do realize this is like the 23 century? Most of those stereotypes were already horribly inaccurate when people first came up with them hundreds of years ago." Jim said, rolling his eyes.

Stupid Roommate said a lot of things after this which pretty much earned him the nickname 'Stupid Roommate' for the rest of the year. The perfect example was him specifically asking Jim not to bring his guy friends back to the room. Apparently, girls would still be warmly welcomed. In true 'I don't give a fuck' Jim Kirk style, he purposely made a point of bringing guys back to the room and only guys, from all over the galaxy, just a piss S.R. off . He wasn't even having sex with most of these individuals. Abrams reaction was priceless and eventually demanded that Jim find a new dorm room. Jim did move, but not before painting the entire room Barbie pink and plastering the walls with old-school posters of naked men. The 'piece de resistance' was the giant rainbow he painted over the front door right before leaving. He didn't even get in trouble for doing it because the RA thought that it was 'creative problem-solving'.

Two years later said roommate pissed in his pants when he found out Jim was going to be his commanding officer. The idiot was also the first redshirt killed on a mission (mostly because he blatantly refused to listen to Jim's orders). You really do have to believe in karma sometimes.

Stupid Roommate was neither the first nor the last opinionated idiot that Jim had to contend with. It's easy for him to let that go. He doesn't care about what the ignorant think about him. Nor does he care about how people who don't know him at all perceive him. If they're not smart enough to realize that 90% of the stuff that he does is pure bravado, they can get fucked.

He is well aware that a lot of people are not going to be happy that he's dating his non-human, non-female first officer. Despite all the scientific advancements in the universe, illogical hatred and prejudice is something that has not been stamped out entirely. The incident that led to his mom being in the 'clinic' for more than a decade and Marcus's own xenophobic crusade is pretty much testament to that. He knows that type of prejudice still exists and he tries not to let himself be hurt by it. He just constantly reminds himself that he is not responsible for the stupidity of others.

Others are not going to be happy that he has a boyfriend and girlfriend. Just because polygamy is recognized by the Federation, it doesn't mean that everybody's cool with it. At least once every two or three years, somebody launches a campaign to have it repealed. It's okay to have different opinions; it's not okay to force them on other people. Nyota's officemate, who went apoplectic when she found out about their relationship, was first on his list of those who have issues with it. Maybe he would be cool with her opinion, if she kept her mouth shut and had not given a certain idiot more ammunition to keep him away from the Enterprise. He's good at ignoring dirty looks and nasty rumors, but somebody using his personal relationship in an attempt to take his baby from him pisses him off.

Even his therapist/ex-boyfriend thinks that dating the two at the same time is some post death/ quarter-life crisis. That particular criticism may have been the reason why he walked out of his therapy session right before he accidentally discovered that pretzels can contain soy via make out session. The guy has called Jim several times to schedule another session, but Jim just deletes his messages without even listening.

So, maybe, he is not as immune to the opinions of others as he likes to pretend. You can only ignore so much. The truth of the matter is he really does care how people see him if that person is somebody that he cares about. How the ex-boyfriend got in that category Jim is never going to understand.

There are a lot of people who should be in that category that are not. His brother is number one on that list because Sam cannot even bother to call Jim, let alone visit him, even after he actually died. Although, Sam would actually have to talk to him to share his disapproval which probably will never happen because the man is just too self-absorbed. Also on this list is any family member that could've taken him in after the Tarsus fiasco, but did not. He honestly doesn't care what people like that actually think about him. If they don't care about him, why should he value their opinion about his life?

The list of people whose opinion he actually values is extremely short and mostly consists of his real friends and certain non-stupid members of Starfleet. (Okay, maybe he does care about what the stupid members of Starfleet think about him, but only because he wants his ship back.)

The number one person that he cares about the opinion of is Spock. Since Spock hasn't run away after accidentally putting him in the hospital (temporarily) due to mislabeled pretzels and the newly discovered mushroom allergy, he figures that Spock is perfectly okay with how things are now. Tied with Spock is Nyota. Since this was her idea in the first place, Jim is going to assume she's perfectly okay with this too and focus on everyone outside of the relationship.

That means the first person who he is going to worry about is other Spock. No matter what dimension the guy is from, Jim is going to value the opinion of Spock, probably more than anyone else. He is kind of like a wise old grandfather or in a weird way his boyfriend's brother. He likes the guy even though he is extremely cryptic when they talk and refuses to tell Jim the best way to deal with his first officer. However, he was willing to listen to Jim's rants about his first officer before they got together. Right now, the old guy is functioning as Jim's counselor until they (his significant others and his commanding officer) can convince him to stop deleting the messages of his actual therapist and see the guy again.

At least the other Admiral Pike realized how uncomfortable seeing his ex in a professional capacity made him and was willing to find him another counselor. Jim told her the only way he would be willing to see another therapist was if she found somebody who knows what it's like to come back from the dead after sacrificing their life in a warp core to save their entire ship. He should really learn to not be that sarcastic with Admiral Number One because she actually found somebody who met his special criteria. It turns out other Spock is finishing his certification to become a Mind Healer. The universe has a truly fucked up sense of humor.

Let's just say he has a lot of free time on his hands until his medical leave is up now that Nyota is the hottest professor at Starfleet Academy. He had free time to devote to Starfleet's mandated therapy, especially since Number One told him that if he didn't talk to other Spock about what happened, he was never going to get his baby back. He went along with it without too much protest. There is only so much time you can spend on preparing cooking lessons for your girlfriend and catching up on your TV. Also, he has a tendency to share a lot over their chess games anyway.

Because this was a Spock and he did actually know what it was like coming back from the dead, Jim felt that he could talk to him about a lot of things that have been featured in his nightmares lately. He adores his Spock and Nyota, but he's kind of terrified to talk about anything related to the warp core incident. He is not ready yet to face their possible recriminations.

At first, Jim was careful to avoid the subject of his dating both Spock's younger counterpart and Nyota, because he is absolutely terrified of the Vulcan's reaction. He hates Spock being displeased with him, even if it's not the version of Spock that he makes out with daily. He will be the first to admit that he was afraid of other Spock reacting badly.

However, it all came out eventually. It is really difficult to not talk about a major component of your life. Okay, it came out because Jim decided to ask him lots of questions about elder Spock's failed relationship with that Vulcan who will not be named. As Jim was expressing his sympathy to elder Spock for having been bonded to such a nasty person - even if it was successfully dissolved later, he sort of mentioned how his Spock would never have to go through that since he had him and Nyota. After the slip, Jim felt like he had to explain. Of course, in true Spock fashion, he responded to the entire explanation with the term "fascinating."

"You think my relationship with you and Nyota is fascinating? Is that Spock speak for 'I cannot believe you are dating two people at the same time' or 'I disapprove, but I am not going to tell you that I disapprove'? Or is this your way of telling me that you're absolutely shocked that other you and I are more than friends when that did not happen the last time around?" Jim asked slightly worried. On screen, other Spock gave him a sympathetic look, well, for Spock anyway.

"I am pleased that you and my counterpart have found each other much earlier in this timeline." Spock tells him. Jim can read between the lines. Older Spock and other Jim were more than friends the first time around, it just took them a lot longer to get there. He was kind of happy that for once he was better than his other self at something. "It is not logical for you to infer so much from one word." Spock admonished him.

"When have I ever been logical?"

"More times than you are aware," Older Spock mumbled under breath. "It is fascinating, because you discovered a way for my younger self to maintain our relationship with Nyota." He found it odd that other Spock said "our relationship" until he started reading between the Spock lines again.

"There's something you're not telling me. You pretty much inferred that we were all together in your timeline." He tells the other Vulcan.

"While at times, I did engage in a romantic relationship with your counterpart as well as Nyota's counterpart, it never occurred simultaneously." Spock tells him with something akin to sadness.

"Because that's not your thing?"

"My relationship with Nyota had become one of only friendship out of necessity by the time I met you." Jim already knew that he met Spock a good decade earlier this time around. "You are very good at inferring things I do not intend for you to infer."

"So, you don't think I'm greedy or deviant for dating two people at the same time? And you're not disappointed in your other self for having multiple partners?" Jim asked older Spock.

"I would never think that about you or your Spock. I commend you for original thinking." This Spock said with a twinkle in his eyes.

"Actually, it was Nyota, who came up with this," Jim told him giving all credit to his super awesome girlfriend.

"I am pleased that she found an alternative to their terminating the relationship due to their mental incompatibility." Jim started coughing profusely when Spock said that. He was also really confused.

"Trust me, those two are very compatible." Jim tells him.

"I am aware. I meant solely as it relates to bonding." Other Spock explained.

"Okay, I can see how that is different. The therapist thinks that my Spock and I have already bonded and that's why other you blacked out when I was- when I was suffering the aftereffects of the warp core incident. I really don't want him looking in my mind, so we don't know for sure." (Jim may have been listening in on the conversation the therapist had with Spock after he stormed out of the guy's office.)

"Although you are wary of this individual, I do recommend that you have him evaluate the situation with all three of you. Things are different in this dimension and perhaps your Spock and Nyota are more compatible. However, your introduction into the relationship means that my counterpart will not need to seek an outside bond with one who is less than favorable regardless." Again, Jim realizes it's more important for him to focus on what Spock is not saying.

"Wait, what do you mean by that?" Jim asked very confused.

"I dislike having to cut this transmission earlier than expected, but I have a meeting and 5.3 minutes." That was such a Spock excuse, but it really didn't surprise him when the screen went blank.

A few seconds later Nyota arrived home. It was time for her first cooking class, so he put his weird conversation with other Spock out of mind. After a mere kiss sent him to the emergency room, he had other things to think about. Honestly, he was just happy that Bones did not discover he developed a Spock allergy.

* * *

This brings him to the next most important person in his life, Bones. If you don't count the two people he is dating (including their alternate selves) or those that are no longer alive to give a new opinion on the situation, the individual that Jim is the most worried about being okay with his new relationship is Bones.

The man is his real brother. He has saved Jim's life more times than Jim would ever like to acknowledge, including that time when it was really supposed to be final. He violated several regulations when he snuck Jim on Enterprise and probably only escaped getting in trouble because Jim's presence prevented a catastrophe. That was just an example of the type of man Bones is.

Bones has sat through numerous of his 'Spock is driving me absolutely crazy' rants. The guy always had his back and therefore, Jim was worried if his friend would be cool with it, especially in light of the fact that Bones was not exactly Spock's biggest fan.

He was also worried because Bones always freaked out whenever Jim told him about any of his sexual activities of a polyamorous nature. Then there's the fact that during his convalescence Bones ended up in the room every time Jim so much as tried to kiss either of his significant others. Bones also argued with Spock in the hallway a lot during that time. Since Spock will not tell him exactly what the doctor said, it can't be good.

The most annoying part of the current situation was the no sex rule. There is a darker part of Jim's mind that wonders if Bones was doing this to try to break up their relationship as fast as possible. Jim was feeling great aside from the allergic reaction to secondhand exposure to soy laced pretzels. He should be able to have sex or at least be able to watch his boyfriend and girlfriend have sex in front of him. Seriously, is two months away from sexual activity really medically necessary or was this his best friend's way of passive aggressively breaking up his relationship without actually saying anything? He doesn't know.

"You're lucky your girlfriend had the good sense to stock up on allergy hypos, otherwise you would've been a goner. After everything we did to get you back, I would really like for you to stay alive for more than a month." Bones groused at him once Jim regained consciousness. They were alone for the moment because his two significant others were filling out paperwork out front.

"After everything, death by anaphylaxis would just be anticlimactic," Jim joked.

"Getting with her is the smartest thing you've ever done. It almost negates you hooking up with the hobgoblin." Bones said putting down his boyfriend once more. Again, it really shouldn't surprise him, but it still hurts.

"You really don't like my boyfriend?" Jim asked, causing the doctor to give him his patent pending 'you are stating the obvious' look. "Actually, I'm kind of surprise you're saying anything nice about Nyota. You're never that supportive of my previous relationships."

"That's because I don't want you to die of some damn alien STI before you hit 30. I'm not generally supportive of any of your random hookups, especially after the incident with the cadet who went off her meds while 'dating' you. You lost me a damn fine doctor. However, this is not the Kitty cat twins or anything else of the kind. I'm happy that you're trying this relationship thing. This may actually work out because Nyota must have the patience of a saint to be willing to put up with both you and the hobgoblin." Jim smiles at his words, the nice part about Nyota anyway.

"But you don't like Spock?" Jim asked again.

"Not when he is marooning you on ice planets or sending you into anaphylaxis because you developed a new veggie allergy and the toddler behind the counter forgot to mention that the pretzels contain soy." Bones groused and Jim frowned.

"Neither of the incidents were Spock's fault. First of all, I practically develop new allergies on a daily basis."

"Ain't that the truth," Bones mumbled.

"Second, I'm pretty much giving Spock a free pass on anything that happened during our first mission. He was kind of in the middle of a very Vulcan nervous breakdown." He told Bones. Considering his own post Pike reaction, Jim really is not in a position to throw stones anyway.

"You don't have to defend your boyfriend to me," Bones shot back. "I dislike him when he refuses to admit that he actually has feelings, but I know he cares about you. You and Spock are good for each other and hopefully, Nyota will be able to keep the two of you from doing stupid stuff." Jim is taken aback by Bones statement.

"So, the ban on us having sex is not your evil scheme to get us to break up?" That question resulted in Bones throwing his hands in the air.

"Good Lord, you are paranoid. Just the fact that you ended up getting hospitalized tonight due to making out proves that you're not healthy enough for sex right now." Bones chastised.

"You may have a point," Jim said be grudgingly.

"Also, as I stated earlier, this is not the Kitty cat twins. I'm telling you this as your friend - you use sex too much as a crutch in your relationships with other people. You don't bother to get to know people because you're afraid for them to see past your façade. Maybe, if you're not allowed to have sex for the next few weeks, you might be able to build something that will actually last. Good Lord, if I wasn't so unrepentantly heterosexual, I'm sure you would have tried sleeping with me too, just because it would've been easier for you."

"Not even then, you're too grumpy," Jim joked.

"And yet, you're head over feet for the hobgoblin." He snarked back.

"Hey, don't talk about my boyfriend like that." Jim said smiling.

"Would you prefer I give you another allergy hypo?" He asked.

"Not really, but you will anyway." He received three more hypos before he was allowed to go home. Of course, when he did get home, his two significant others wouldn't eat anything without scanning it first, which he found rather endearing.

* * *

After Leonard, the person whose opinion he values most is or rather was Chris. He is the closest thing Jim has ever had to a real father (Everybody knows the stepdads never actually earned the 'dad' part of that title). Losing the ship did not hurt nearly as much as seeing the look of disappointment in Chris's eyes as the man pretty much told Jim that he was an absolute fuck up in the best way possible. He wonders if Chris blames him for not being able to save him. Chris' death is the thing Jim feels most guilty about.

He also wonders if Chris would be okay with him dating both Spock and Nyota simultaneously. His father figure despised his fucking around ways and wanted Jim to get serious. Okay, maybe he was tired of rescuing Jim when things got handcuffed to a bed bad. Also, the man was really mad at Jim for the fiasco with his niece, although Chris acknowledged that Christine was also at fault, since she went off her medication.

Given that Pike had slipped him all the ways he could technically date his first officer, Jim knew he didn't have a problem with his choice. Jim could tell that Chris wanted him to have more than an endless string of one night stands with a high probability of his dying from some alien STI at some point. He wanted Jim to connect with people and build emotional attachments. He wanted Jim to stop keeping people at a distance. Spock did mention that Chris had been slowly pushing him to realize that he had 'a thing' for Jim. Even so, Jim wasn't sure if the man would be okay with the current configuration of the relationship. Jim would have loved to have had his father figure's direct approval about his new relationship, but it was just not possible.

However, the other Admiral Pike did know and she was okay with it. If she was okay with the relationship, then Jim was sure Chris would've been too. Actually, she was more than okay with it. She was willing to go to bat for him when a certain Admiral who will remain nameless (although said bastard already completely fucked up his childhood by sending his family to the planet of the damned, because his mother wouldn't sleep with him.) For the sake of this internal ramble, we will just refer to him as Admiral X. It is best for Jim sanity to not say the guy's name out loud.

The man was twice as incompetent as Marcus and just as crazy. According to his intel, Admiral X was part of the tribunal that took away his ship without even allowing him to testify in his own defense. (If he hadn't been so distraught over the fact that his mentor was completely disappointed in him, he would have realized that the whole tribunal thing was not exactly regulation.) Jim's not that surprised to learn of his involvement because the man is convinced Jim is the reason why it took him an additional 10 years to become an Admiral. Let's just say Jim didn't exactly keep his mouth shut post Tarsus fiasco.

It was obvious to Jim that the man was not happy that Jim's demotion may not stick due to his heroic actions during the vengeance incident. Admiral X was looking for something new to use and apparently that was going to be Jim's 'deviant sexual behavior'. Apparently, Starfleet or rather Admiral X was perfectly cool with him fucking around with half the galaxy (the female half anyway), but being in a committed relationship with two other people was improper (or maybe it was just because one of those two has a dick). The absurdity was not lost on him.

From what Jim has gathered from various sources, Admiral X was handed his new way to make Jim's life miserable by Nyota's office mate, also known as the woman who gave Jim dirty looks at the pizza place. Nyota's office mate served under Nyota's mother during the implosion of Nyota's parent's marriage due to the fact that the guy couldn't keep his dick to himself. The woman just happened to see him kissing Spock on their pizza date and completely freaked out. Instead of actually talking to Nyota, she assumed that history was repeating itself and decided to tell everybody, including Admiral X. In light of recent revelations, her reaction probably would've been worse if she knew the entire truth.

According to Nyota, the sleazy Admiral has been trying to hook up with her mom since before the divorce. He even tried the same thing that he did with Jim's mom. However, the woman who birthed his girlfriend threatened an EEO lawsuit and was promptly returned to her original assignment. Apparently, Admiral X thought that he could finally get in the woman's 'good graces' after trying to ruin her career, by sticking it to the guy who is corrupting her daughter and possibly taking her boyfriend. It was just a bonus that the guy doing the corrupting was someone that he already hated. There was also the fact the man was a crony of the late Admiral Marcus and would love to discredit Jim to keep his precious mentor's reputation intact.

His initial goal was to kick Jim out for violating the fraternization policy and for allowing that personal relationship to impair his judgment, i.e. the volcano incident. X was not happy when Jim's new favorite Admiral told him that she already knew all about their relationship and had approved it. He was even angrier when he found out that it did not predate the volcano incident.

Admiral X's new goals were to either get Jim to leave/get kicked out of Starfleet or to guarantee that he will be staying at the Academy for the rest of his career. At the very least, he wanted to make sure that Jim is never going to be able to serve with his boyfriend and girlfriend ever again which would probably lead to him leaving Starfleet within about a week. The end result was Jim being taken off of medical leave a week earlier than was recommended by his doctor and being called in for a hearing about how his relationship with his first officer impaired his judgment under the guise of a hearing about the Vengeance incident. It was obvious that X was doing this to catch Jim off guard at a hearing that might as well be called an interrogation.

According to that same source from earlier, Admiral X thinks that his relationship with Spock is an abomination and which is why he is singling Jim out. That was pretty obvious during the two-hour interrogation- sorry, hearing. He survived most of it through his ability to bullshit his way out of any situation and Spock presenting the group with the preliminary findings of the therapist including the partial bonding theory which Spock had neglected to mention to Jim (even if he already knew).

Spock said he was trying to make arrangements with a mind healer who specializes in Vulcan bonds and did not want to discuss this until he had substantial proof. However, current circumstances dictated that he disclose this information now. Jim is just happy that this gave one of the non-evil admirals an excuse to call a recess for 48 hours to substantiate Spock's claims. If it was true, it was going to completely undermine what Admiral X wanted to accomplish.

Now, Jim really does not give a fuck about what Admiral X thinks about him, even if he doesn't want to deal with this farce two days after being hospitalized for an allergic reaction. He does care about his ship, though. He also cares about the careers of his two significant others, which is the only reason why he is considering a suggestion made by one of the less hostile admirals, Admiral Rodriguez. She suggested that he convince Starfleet that he was no longer engaged in a non-platonic relationship, but continue on as they were in private. Rodriguez served with both his and Nyota's mothers and felt it was her job to watch out for the two.

She stopped by his and Spock's office while they were in the middle of "discussing" the bonding thing. Okay, they were yelling at each other and it only got worse after he accidentally told the two about his conversation a few days ago earlier with other Spock. (Most of the yelling was coming from Nyota, because they kept something very important from her.) However, as soon as Admiral Rodriguez arrived, they presented a united front and decided to focus on the real enemy, X.

After Rodriguez left, Nyota put an arm around Jim and said, "It's a good idea, or at least not an absolutely horrible one. It would keep X from using us against you. If you want, I could stage some big breakup with Spock and you can be his public boyfriend." Nyota offered. "You shouldn't have to hide the fact that you love him. Technically, you guys are married, sort of, maybe."

Jim is pretty sure this is the moment that he fell head over heels in love with her. Most people would be really angry to find out that their boyfriend sort of married someone else while they were dating. Even more impressive was that she generously made the suggestion moments after finding out that if the universe really was constant then she and Spock were never going to be able to have that same level of mental intimacy. But this beautiful, brilliant woman in front of him accepted it (although, she was ticked that they did not tell her earlier because they thought that she would react badly).

"You are the greatest woman in the universe. If there wasn't a Starfleet security camera watching us, I would show you how wonderful you truly are, even if such activities are against Doctor's orders." She smiled at him and Spock squeezed his hand, which was kind of shocking in itself.

"I was thinking the same thing, but the other way around."

He doesn't have the heart to tell either that X would probably be less able to use this against them if let's say Carol Marcus was part of the triad instead of Spock. "I don't care in public if I'm just a friend. They don't have a right to know about our relationship and trust me, people are more likely to see me as just Spock's friend who just happens to share an apartment with him and his amazing girlfriend of three years than believe you are platonically living with your ex and his new boyfriend.

"I mean, let's be honest, even in the 23rd century, people assume that tough manly men do not like other manly men," Nyota said with a snicker. "Sometimes you can use people's ignorant preconceptions against them and this is one of those times. Although, I can't believe that anybody with any common sense is going to believe that scenario."

"Thankfully, the idiots in charge have no common sense." Jim mumbled under his breath.

"I am finding that to be highly evident." Spock said from his other side and at this point, Jim was already ready to forgive him for what happened earlier. Okay, he's expecting at least a backrub out of this, but he will collect it later.

"I don't care if the public in general doesn't know about our relationship, but the thing is, I don't want to lie to the admiralty. Starfleet is a big part of my life and I don't want it to be a lie. Asking me to do this is like regressing 250 years to the "Don't ask - Don't tell" era of the US military. At the same time, they're holding my ship and your careers hostage. I feel like this is my only choice." He said sadly.

"I thought you did not care what other people think." Spock remarked.

"I don't. At least, not people who don't matter. I care about both of you and I'm not going to let certain idiots derail both of your careers because of me. It's one thing if they want to keep me in the Academy for the rest of my career; maybe, I deserved it for leading us all into Marcus' trap. However, I will not stand by and watch you and Nyota get hurt by something I did. If that means pretending to be just a friend in public, I will do it." He doesn't explain that was the real reason why he did the thing in the warp core. Maybe he is a little too skilled at sacrificing his own happiness, but it's better this way.

"The idiot wants me out of here and you two are just collateral damage. I will do whatever I have to do to make sure that doesn't happen." he said firmly.

"You know when you're having really private conversations you probably should learn to lock your door." Admiral Number One said as she stood in his doorway. "Trust me, nobody is madder than me that Admiral X decided to schedule this farce of a hearing first thing in the morning when I was at a doctor's appointment. If Admiral Rodriguez hadn't called me, I wouldn't have had any clue what he was doing." From the tone of her voice, you could tell that she was very angry.

"Did she tell you that she suggested that Jim pretend to dissolve his relationship with us?" Spock questioned.

"Yes and me screaming at her is the reason why I did not arrive here sooner." She said pulling her PADD out of her bag. "I'm sending you a file containing everything related to Starfleet regulations regarding romantic relationships and respecting the cultures of others. Polyandry is a Vulcan cultural practice and therefore it would be improper for anyone in Starfleet to impose human cultural norms. I also have a list of lawyers who want nothing more than to challenge Admiral X. Several are former Starfleet." The fact that she was doing this for him, made him smile. It also showed him that his pseudo-mommy really was okay with everything. Spock was already digging into the file.

"How did you have time to compile such a comprehensive file?" Spock asked looking up from his PADD.

"I didn't. Chris put this together months ago after the lizard girl incident. He said you guys would need it - eventually." Again, Jim was good at reading between the lines. She was basically telling him that Chris was so okay with the possibility of the three of them being together that he put together a special file in case they had to deal with someone like Admiral X. The realization almost made him cry.

"He really was okay with it?" Jim asked softly.

"Yes, he was." She said, putting her PADD back in her bag, which caused the bottle of vitamins to fallout, prenatal vitamins to be exact. It was in that moment that everything clicked into place.

"I assume you're not developing bulimia." He said handing back the vitamins.

"No, just morning sickness. I am three months pregnant."

"Oh." It was the only thing he could say. He felt unbelievably guilty at that moment. Not only did his actions cost him his mentor, but the child that Number One was carrying was going to grow up like him. Nyota sensed his uneasiness and wrapped an arm around him and Spock grabbed his hand.

"Jim, I am not like your mom. I am not going to take my grief out on an innocent child. I am not going to be alone either. You are going to be an honorary uncle for one thing. Also, this is the reason why Christine is back. I will need help," she said. He was about to tell her that he would help her and she did not need Christine, but she cut off his objection. "I know you're not happy about her being here, but it's necessary, especially if I accomplish my goal of getting you back on Enterprise permanently." Okay, she had a point there.

"Just please tell me she's taking her medication?" Jim hope the answer to this question was, yes, because he was not going to let Chris's kid be around a crazy Christine Chapel.

"Yes, she is taking her medication and she is seeing her therapist regularly. Speaking about therapy…" She started.

"Don't make me go back to him."

"I do not have much of a choice considering the time constraint we are under. I have try to find an alternative. He has tried to find an alternative. He is the only certified Vulcan mind expert currently not on the colony that is willing to work with you," she said with a sigh.

"Would it help if I said I was sorry for what I said to you in therapy and I did not mean it the way you thought I did." The therapist said as he walked into the room. Jim wonders exactly how long he has been listening.

"Maybe," Jim said grudgingly. Jim waved the guy into the room for their outsmart Admiral X planning session which included proving that he was sort of bonded to Spock. (He doesn't have the energy to discuss what that will entail.) Later, they are joined by Bones who brought Carol, because she knows most of the admiralty and their weaknesses. Eventually, the rest of the bridge crew and his favorite engineer showed up because they were beyond angry about what Admiral X was doing. It made Jim felt good that he had so many friends that believed in him. It was because of that he just knew X was going down.

To be continued.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Like Admiral K in some of my other stories Admiral X is a symbol of general corruption and what's wrong with government overall. Because of that he doesn't have an actual name.


	5. Chapter 5: Don’t throw your PADD at the B in the cubicle next door

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Before you get involved in a polyamorous relationship, you need to ask yourself what do you really want out of it? If you’re in this for easy meaningless sex with lots of different partners, then you may want to look up the definition of relationship again. Nothing about this will be easy. Relationships are never easy, even when only two people are involved.
> 
> Chapter 1 of The Idiot’s Guide to Multi-species Polyamorous Relationships, revised fifth edition

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everybody who read or reviewed the last chapter. Also, thank you to everybody who has been leaving Kudos or adding the story to your alerts.
> 
> So to answer a question that popped up in a review, I am planning to do a very Jim Kirk high school reunion. The way I have the series outlined that will not occur until November in the story after my obligatory meet the parents story. However, I’ m very anxious to write the high school reunion story. My question to everyone is would you be okay if I wrote the stories in this series out of chronological order? It will be a little confusing for those of you reading this story on FF unless I put that story separately, but it should be fine for everyone else.
> 
>  
> 
> After a discussion on A3O with WeirdLittleStories, I thought I should specifically mention that it is a major breach of ethics for a psychologist to treat his or her former significant other. While it would be less of a breach of ethics to treat a former significant other's new partner, it's still a breach of ethics.
> 
> The situation in this story is very gray due to the fact that most doctors trained in this particular branch of the profession were wiped out during the Vulcan genocide and the rest do not have the security clearance to know about the 'warp core incident'. In addition, there is a lot going on in this story that you don't know yet that will come out in the next chapter. However, after my discussion with WeirdLittleStories I did tweak a few things in this chapter for the sake of realism after proofreading by GraysonSteele. I apologize now for any typos I inadvertently added.

 

“You didn’t have to come with me.” Nyota said as she waited in the lobby of the medical offices. She was beyond pissed she was there for Starfleet mandated therapy. She blames Tiffany-- sorry, Lieutenant Bailey. If her officemate would just shut up and keep her snide comments about Nyota’s choice of boyfriends to herself, Admiral Rodriguez, who is now in charge at Starfleet Academy due to Admiral Barnett’s recent promotion, would not be ordering her to see a therapist. If the Lieutenant would have just stayed quiet about what she’d seen in a certain pizza place one day three weeks ago and not given ammunition to a certain Admiral who hates Jim or refrained from telling Nyota that her mom would be so disappointed in her for being so clueless/‘loose’, she would have never thrown a PADD at the woman. Really, this was all her fault.

“We both know if I don’t come with you, you’re going to ditch.” Her boyfriend and Captain said knowing her a little too well for someone she’s been dating for less than two months.

“If you ditch, Admiral Rodriguez is going to extend your tour at the Academy way beyond the time it takes Enterprise to become functional which means I would have to find a new chief communications officer. You know how much I hate going through resumes.” Jim squeezed her hand at that.

It was about the only display of affection that any of the triad were willing to risk in public after the great pizza debacle. This was made worse by the fact the guy already hated Jim with a passion and is looking for any reason to get Jim out of Starfleet for good. The animosity was mutual. She cannot even say the guy’s name in front of Jim without him twitching and that was before he tried to use their relationship to get Jim out of Starfleet once and for all. For the sake of Jim’s sanity, she uses his nickname of Admiral X, but she personally prefers Admiral Moron.

The good news was after their lawyer tore holes in every single one of Admiral Moron’s arguments the rational members of the board decided Jim will get Enterprise back as soon as the ship was in working condition, which according to Mister Scott would be sometime in January, if they were lucky. The bad news is they had to agree to keep their relationship quiet. That meant no public activities that they could not pass off as Jim going out with his two friends. Public kissing was definitely on the no list. She barely got away with dancing with Jim at his ‘we are happy you’re alive’ party. Although, to be fair, it may have something to do with the fact that the type of dancing they were doing probably belongs in the category of ‘having sex with clothing on’.

It felt like dating Spock again when she was a student, but if she did it once she can do it again. Jim deserves to be Captain of the Enterprise and she will do whatever she has to do to keep him in that position. She will not let anybody use their relationship as a means to hurt him. She is just a little annoyed that Starfleet felt they have a right to control her love life in any way, shape, or form. She blames Admiral Moron for this.

“I am not you,” she tells him with a playful smirk. “I’m not the one who played sick to avoid therapy.”

“That was like one time.” Jim said only to have her give him the look. “Okay, it was about four times, but I did go to my session with Dr. Caraballo last week. We had a really fun conversation about why I call Admiral X – Admiral X.” She is sure that Jim and his new doctor talked about other things besides that (even if Jim is not allowed to tell Dr. Caraballo any specifics regarding how he survived the warp core incident), but she wasn’t going to push. At that moment, Dr. Kim arrived in the waiting area to bring her back to his office.

She’s not exactly happy that she’s being forced to see Jim’s ex-boyfriend, but she doesn’t want to explain to Admiral Rodriguez why she doesn’t want to see (or should see) this particular doctor. Starfleet already thinks that Jim is a slut. She doesn’t want more people thinking that.

“Be a good girl for Dr. Freud and we’ll get ice cream afterwards.” Jim said as a joke, she hopes.

“It’s Dr. Kim,” She corrected him. “Should I be worried that you can’t even remember your ex-boyfriend’s name?”

“I only remember the names of people I really like. No offense.” Jim said, gesturing to the doctor.

“None taken, considering I know you are just being you.”

“You know, maybe you would benefit from this session more than I would. I don’t know why Admiral Rodriguez is making me come here. It’s not like the PADD actually hit the bi--woman,” Nyota said as she tried to make a run for the door, but Jim stopped her.

“That’s because she ducked,” Jim mutters in her ear. “Quit stalling. If you don’t go in there right now, you will never be able to force me to go to therapy again. I don’t want to have to pull rank on you, but I will.” He said forcefully as he literally pushes her towards the doctor’s office.

“God, you’re a jackass,” She mumbles under her breathe before following the doctor.

* * *

 

“Should I be worried that somebody in Starfleet believed it would be a good idea for me to see you to deal with my alleged anger management issues? Isn’t there a rule that you can’t treat the girlfriend of your ex-boyfriend?” Nyota asked as she nervously sat on one of the couches.

“Yes, and I question the wisdom of this arrangement. You know that the idiots that be are not known for making rational or ethical decisions. I’m sure you’re here in part because I already know that Jim Kirk is your boyfriend, one of them, anyway.” Dr. Kim said sarcastically, which made her realize what Jim could have seen in the guy. He was attractive, witty and smart which was Jim’s favorite combination.

“Yes, Admiral Moron decided it would be bad if more people in Starfleet find out about my supposedly deviant sexual behavior.” She responded with equal sarcasm.

“The fact that you have two boyfriends is not deviant sexual behavior. As long as your ability to do your job is not influence by your personal life, then it’s none of Starfleet’s business who you love or sleep with.” He told her sincerely. “However, the fact that you threw a PADD at your coworker is a legitimate concern.”

“Weren’t you the one who told Jim that dating the two of us was his version of a quarter life crisis?” She asked in an effort to point out his own hypocrisy.

“That’s not exactly what I said, but Jim does have a tendency to take things the wrong way.” She nodded her head in agreement with that statement because no one took things the wrong way better than Jim Kirk.

“I meant that Jim actually trying to have a real relationship was a sign of a quarter life crisis for him. He doesn’t do relationships and the fact that Jim is trying is probably the aftereffects of him surviving a near-death experience. His choice to try a real relationship at this time obviously reflects a decision to reevaluate his personal priorities.”

“You may be right about that,” she told the doctor honestly. “But it wasn’t just Jim. We were all living in denial. Sometimes I think that if Jim did not die, we would have just continued going on as we were, ignoring the truth of what we all felt for each other.”

“The fact that I already know that your boyfriend suffered more than just mere radiation poisoning during what he refers to as the ‘warp core incident’ is the other reason why you’re in my office. This is the only reason why I'm in here right now instead of Dr. Caraballo. The fewer people that know about what happened that day the better, but you need to talk about it with someone and since I already know I think we should talk about it.” Doctor Kim tells her with a sad smile.

“I am aware that Jim does not exactly have the best track record when it comes to actual dating, but he’s doing pretty good so far.” Nyota said, ignoring everything he said related to the warp core incident. She refuses to talk about that with anybody - even Jim and Spock. Now that the debriefings are over, she never wants to think about Jim dying ever again.

“This morning he took me out for breakfast at this crazy little place down the street that makes apple pie pancakes. Also, he had a best friend movie night with Bones, just so Spock and I could...” Nyota stopped herself. She was not going to tell this Doctor that Jim left her and Spock alone so they could have sex. She is also definitely not going to mention all the obscene text messages that Jim sends her during the day.

She personally believes that Jim can survive a hand job without serious physical consequences, but she doesn’t have Doctor McCoy on her side, yet. Thankfully, there were only two more weeks until the ridiculous sex ban was supposed to be lifted and she could not wait. The thing three nights ago with Spock barely took the edge off. That may be the other reason for the PADD incident two days ago. Sex is her favorite coping strategy for stress and it’s been cut down to a bare minimum, because she really doesn’t want to do anything to send Jim back to the emergency room. The last time was bad enough. She doesn’t like when Jim almost dies on her.

“I thought I was here to talk about throwing a PADD at a simpleminded idiot who has no business at Starfleet, let alone teaching future members, if she’s going to spew out hate speech under the guise of being concerned for me.” Nyota said, changing the subject. “By the way, I would just like to remind you that I missed, so there’s really no point of me being here at all. I could be doing other things.”

“No, we are here to get to the reason why you felt it was a good idea to throw something at her. The last two months have been very rough on you.” He said before listing everything that has gone wrong in her life during the last two months. The list included boyfriend number one almost dying during the volcano incident due to his martyr complex, future boyfriend number two actually dying in the warp core, watching boyfriend number one go off the deep end because boyfriend number two died in the warp core, convincing boyfriend number one and boyfriend number two that they should all be together and finally having an idiot of an admiral try to split up her and her boyfriends because of some stupid personal vendetta. It’s not their fault that both of their mothers were too smart to be coerced into dating the idiot, despite his threats to their careers.

What he did to Winona Kirk was horrible. She cannot wait until Admiral Moron finds out the woman he tried to reassign to Delta Vega was going to be a fellow admiral soon. She wasn’t happy about her mom being planet side starting in July, except for the fact it will make Admiral Moron really miserable.

Anything that makes that idiot miserable makes her happy, even if it means that she may be listening to her mom complain about her dating two guys at the same time for the foreseeable future. Her mom hasn’t said anything negative about the arrangement yet, but she’s probably waiting to say all the nasty things in person. Her mom always had more decorum then her father, who had no trouble telling her how disappointed he is via vidcall.

“Okay, I realize that I’ve had a couple of bad weeks, but what happened two days ago does not have anything to do with me watching either of my boyfriends almost die or having a megalomaniac try to kill me. The reason why I threw a PADD at Lieutenant Bailey was because I knew I could not get away with punching her for her snide comments about my love life.” The doctor just rolled his eyes at her non-answer. She was planning to make this therapy session as difficult as possible on him.

Jim needed therapy, but she did not. It wasn’t like she was waking up screaming. She was dealing with everything perfectly fine. She was fine.

“I think that what happened with Lieutenant Bailey is symptomatic of a bigger problem than her expressing displeasure with the fact that you practice polyandry. I think we should talk about the warp core incident. You’ve already tried to avoid talking about this once this session.”

“Let’s not. Watching Jim almost die has nothing to do with this. Neither does Spock’s volcano martyr act. I acted the way I did because I’m tired of somebody who doesn’t know me thinking that she has a right to tell me what’s best for me. She may have served with mom when my parents’ marriage went to hell, but that doesn’t mean that she knows anything about the current situation. She doesn’t. I’m not my mother and more importantly, Spock is not my father. For that matter, Jim is not my father, either. Both of my boyfriend’s believe in monogamy or rather the polyamorous equivalent. In other words, they are not going to fuck around behind my back with other people with the truth only coming out because somebody got pregnant.”

“So you’re upset about her making assumptions about you based on what she knows about your mother’s failed marriage to your father?” The Doctor asked thankfully avoiding her last few statements.

“I don’t know, maybe. I hate when people make assumptions about me because they’re usually wrong.”

“Are you referring to the assumption that you’re some sexual deviant because you have two boyfriends?” The Doctor asked.

“Yes, that particular assumption is a little annoying. Considering that I haven’t even…” She started but stopped, again because she was not telling this guy anything about her sex life.

“Enjoyed the pleasure of a Jim Kirk sandwich?” He prompted.

“See this is why your therapist should not be somebody who has had sex with your boyfriend.” She responded with a roll of her eyes.

“Under normal circumstances, I would completely agree with you. Does that bother you?”

A little, but she is not going to say that out loud. She’s not planning to hold this against Jim, because nobody is coming into this relationship virgin pure. They have all made questionable dating choices in the past. It’s just there something a little irritating about having to spill your personal secrets to a guy who knows firsthand if the rumor about Jim Kirk’s oral skills was true.

“Look, I don’t care if people, including members of the admiralty, think I’m some sort of slut because I have two boyfriends,” she tells him. Oddly, people saying the same thing about Jim really does bother her, but not for the reasons that people would think. Enjoying sex doesn’t mean you’re a slut. In Jim’s case, it just meant that he was relationship phobic. Okay, in her case, it was virtually the same until Spock convinced her that she could do a relationship with himbecause he wasn’t going to betray her like her father did to her mother.

“That particular rumor is not new. I mean half the ship is still under the impression I became the youngest communications officer in Starfleet history, because I’m good at giving head, not because I’m a Klingon and Romulan language specialist. What makes me mad is people think that I am involved in this polyamorous relationship because I don’t want to admit that my boyfriend has moved on without me.” She didn’t mean to say that, it just sort of spewed out of her mouth in a scream.

“Is that why you’re doing this?” The doctor asked in a very calm voice.

About three hours before the PADD incident, her father asked her that same question via the most uncomfortable video conference she had ever sat through. Unlike her father, the doctor in front of her seems to actually want to know the answer. He also will not accuse her of lying to herself or being completely delusional.

“No. I love Spock. I would do anything for him except be in a loveless relationship.” Years ago, when she first realize that her mom was staying married to her dad even though her mother knew things were coming apart, Nyota promised herself that she would never stay in a relationship where love was truly dead. She would not be her mother.

“Spock loves me. I know that he does with every little thing he does for me. Spock stops by my office all the time to bring me lunch or brings me little things to keep me from strangling the students. Just this morning he emailed me an article with 50 tips for better teaching.” Spock actually wanted to bring her to therapy too, but he was busy rewriting the code for a certain unwinnable test. Admiral Chan, the woman taking over for Admiral Marcus, decided that after recent events, she didn’t feel comfortable forcing students to take an exam where they were in a truly hopeless situation.

“That’s very sweet of him,” the doctor remarked.

“It is, but I still know he loves Jim too and it has nothing to do with accidental bonding. I think they’ve been falling for each other since the moment they met. That’s okay because I love Jim too.” She covers her mouth when she admits that because it is the first time that she has said those words out loud to anybody. She has not even told Jim that she’s in love with him yet. She has not really realized it until this moment.

“You didn’t mean to tell me that did you?” The Doctor asked and she just shakes her head no before continuing.

“Lieutenant Bailey thinks I am making all my mother’s mistakes again. In reality, I’m probably making my own mistakes, but at least they’re my mistakes. I mean, if I was going to make my mom’s mistakes, I would be several light-years away on another ship instead of dealing with asinine office mates and first year Academy students, who cannot remember to bring their damn PADD to class.”

“Okay, I’m sensing some lingering parental issues.” He tells her scribbling something down.

“I worked through those issues long ago. My decision to take a planet based assignment teaching cadets, so I don’t get reassigned while my boyfriends are trying to put Enterprise back together, again, is not a symptom of my daddy or mommy issues. Just like my never wanting to get married is not a sign that I’m still upset that my parent’s marriage imploded. Don’t try to read things into it that aren’t there,” she tells him with annoyance.

“You don’t want to get married?” Doctor Kim asked her.

“No. What’s the point of having a piece of paper that says you’re going to spend the rest of your life with somebody when that promise can so easily be broken,” she explains. The doctor gives her a weird look.

“However, you are dating someone who requires a commitment from you for the sake of his physical well-being.”

“You know about that?” She asked because she’s under the impression that discussion of that medical condition is very taboo in Vulcan society. She’s only learned the specific details in the last month because of the accidental bonding thing.

“Again, there’s a reason why I’m your therapist despite the murky ethics of this. I’m also only one of two physicians still in Starfleet that know anything about Pon Farr. The other is Doctor McCoy. My knowledge comes first hand because I’m bonded to a Vulcan. There was a third, but he went into private practice on the colony. If certain members of the Admiralty keep asking me to do things that could lead to me losing my license, I may join him very soon.”

“You’re married? To a Vulcan? How did that happen?” She spluttered out. 

“It’s a long story involving a conveniently timed medical conference and my friend and colleague having a very bad reaction to losing his wife and daughter when Vulcan was destroyed. I love him. So I did what I had to do. And let’s just say that it’s better for all parties involved if I stay on Earth and work with the displaced Vulcan population here.” She doesn’t quite understand what he’s telling her, but she doesn’t ask. It’s none of her business.

“I get that. I love Spock. To keep him healthy and alive, I would have bonded with him. Although, that’s not an option and fortunately he has Jim.” She said with no inflection. Despite what everybody thinks, she is not upset that Jim and Spock are already bonded.

“We don’t know that for sure, because you won’t let anyone check. I think you are happy about that. Are you glad that you don’t have to commit to forever?”

“See, this is why I hate people thinking that they know me. You don’t know what I’m thinking. I’m done. This is never going to work.” Without even thinking, she runs out of his office and past Jim. She can’t deal with Jim right now. She doesn’t want to talk to anybody because a part of her knows that the doctor is right and she doesn’t want him to be. She is relieved that she doesn’t have to choose between bonding and losing Spock. She doesn’t want to face the truth that deep down, maybe she is a selfish person just like a certain office mate accused her of being. The accusation was what really led to her throwing the PADD at her.

To be continued

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter turned out shorter than I intended due to a combination of unexpected houseguests and an extremely hectic work schedule. Also, a sore throat does not make things easier.


	6. When were you going to tell me that?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Secrets are bad and they usually have a tendency to come out at the worst possible time. Secrets can completely destroy your relationship. If you want to make this or any other relationship work, honest communication is necessary even when it’s painful.  
> Chapter 2 of The Idiot’s Guide to Multi-species Polyamorous Relationships, revised fifth edition

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everybody who read or reviewed the last chapter. I am sorry for the lag between updates. I’ve been in a bit of a writers depression, where I hate everything I write and rewrite every single chapter twice (at the very least). Reviews, kudos and favorites help keep me focused. Also I needed to work on some of my other stories and I got a little distracted by my entries for KS advent 2013. If you want to read two stories about Jim and Spock hooking up due to meddling interns and completely awesome ex-girlfriends check out my two stories I Think There Are Rules about This Sort of Thing and Operation Cheer Jim Up. I would love to know what you guys think of these two stories and if I should consider doing the challenge again next year.  
> The break did give me time to figure out how I’m ending the story and working up my courage to write something that will earn this story it’s rating on the non fanfiction.net sites. I have a feeling I’m going to need a lot of encouragement to try writing anything remotely erotic.
> 
> Bonus points to anybody who can tell me where the title of this chapter comes from. It is a direct quote from somewhere.

 

Vulcans do not worry. Such behavior is illogical and unproductive. However, that does not mean that Spock does not keep checking the time every 2.3 minutes during his meeting with Admiral Rodriguez and various members of the Academy faculty regarding the redesign of the Kobayashi Maru. (Or send James electronic messages every 5.4 minutes.) Yes, he knew exactly what time it was, but he still kept checking the clock in the back of the room. He would much rather accompany Nyota to her therapy appointment than listen to various colleagues debating the merits of changing the test.

 

After watching Jim die to save everybody on board Enterprise in what was supposed to be a no-win scenario, Spock is not sure he could redesign a simulation that is completely devoid of hope or subject unaware cadets to such a situation. Actually, Spock is uncertain he wants to design a simulation that only looks like a no-win scenario on the surface. Again, it is too reminiscent of recent events with James. Of course, Spock was specifically barred from mentioning this.

 

Spock sees no point of him being here when he is not allowed to present such a valid argument. Neither does he want to be here, but Admiral Rodriguez and Admiral Pike gave him little choice. He was told in no uncertain terms that if he does not do what he is told, he will be assigned to another ship as first officer or even Captain, if that was what it took to separate him from James and/or Nyota.

 

On paper it seems like they won against Admiral X because James is now officially Captain of Enterprise and Spock has been reinstated as his first officer, despite the fact that they were bonded, but Spock knew better. It was a strategic retreat. The Admiral was waiting for an opportunity to either prove that their relationship is adversely affecting their ability to do their job or to produce enough outside stress to fracture the relationship for purposes that only the Admiral is aware. As the Ambassador's son, he understood political games better than his two lovers. Spock is certain that is why Admiral Rodriguez came to speak to him yesterday instead of going to James.

 

"Actually, I’m glad that Captain Kirk is not here right now, because I think it’s better if you’re the one who deals with this. Also, because you are a Vulcan, I don’t need to sugarcoat this with you. Honestly, I prefer you not tell your boyfriend and girlfriend what’s going on until the investigation is done.” Admiral Rodriguez began.

 

“I understand the need for discretion.” Spock told her. Although he does not want to keep secrets from James, he is aware that sometimes information needs to be withheld for the sake of the mission or for security reasons.

 

"We have evidence to believe that Lieutenant Bailey deliberately provoked your girlfriend. At present, we believe that a certain Adm. that I will only refer to as X paid or otherwise persuaded Lieutenant Bailey to antagonize or rather to create a hostile work environment for Lieutenant Uhura.” Spock does not even blink at her words, because he does not find them surprising in the least. However, Spock is certain James would be cursing at such a revelation.

 

“For what purpose?” Spock asked his voice devoid of inflection.

 

“That’s part of what were still investigating.” Admiral Rodriguez sighed. “It could be anything from trying to get her to leave Starfleet to trying to get her to break up with you and Jim. We don’t know and Bailey is not talking anymore.”

 

“But you believe there was another reason?” Spock questioned the Admiral.

 

“X is not happy that the rest of the admiralty agreed that Starfleet cannot interfere with your personal relationship, so long as it doesn’t affect your ability to do your job. However…” She stops there, but Spock understands her true meaning.

 

“However, if he has evidence to prove that we are not doing our jobs adequately due to our personal relationship, the issue will be revisited. Yesterday’s incident was most likely manufactured in an attempt to provide such evidence.” Spock provide matter-of-factly.

 

“Probably,” Admiral Rodriguez sighs. “Let me tell you, it was in our best interest that Uhura missed. If the PADD had hit Bailey, I would not be able to keep this internal. Until I can prove beyond a doubt that my esteemed colleague set this entire thing up, I’m making them both attend anger management therapy.  I am also making arrangements to have Lieutenant Bailey reassigned. I think Delta Vega may be in need of a communications specialist. Dr. Caraballo is good at what she does and she agreed to see Lieutenant Uhura.”

 

“If she’d actually hit the Lieutenant?” Spock asked, wondering what the worst case scenario would have been.

 

“We would be back before the admiralty trying to fight for the three of you to stay together or even fighting for Lieutenant Uhura to be able to stay in Starfleet at all. Your girlfriend is now an Admiral’s daughter and she’s dating a starship captain and first officer, even if only a handful of Starfleet officials know about it. We have to—I have to avoid all appearances of nepotism and impropriety. They're going to be looking at her the closest of all of you. If she’d actually hit Lieutenant Bailey, I couldn’t cover it up.” Spock was already well aware they would be watched closely. Admiral Marcus was well-liked by many who were still having difficulties accepting his actions related to the Vengeance incident. People were angry, James made a convenient scapegoat. However, as a result of their actions during the Vengeance incident, both he and James were untouchable. Therefore, the easiest person to go after was Nyota.

 

“Nor would I expect you to.” Spock replied simply.

 

“Well you’re Vulcan. I don’t even think nepotism and favoritism are words in your vocabulary. I mean, you actually reported your boyfriend for violating the prime directive. Someone who has no trouble throwing their lover under the proverbial bus is obviously not going to play favorites.” Spock is certain she means this as a compliment. He does not take it that way especially in light of the factual errors in her comment.

 

Spock doesn’t correct her statement. Technically, he and James were not together at the time, but he was already in love with James. He also feels that it’s in his best interest not to say that he only reported James violation of the prime directive to prove to himself that his feelings were not influencing his decision. If he had to do it again, at the very least, he would have told James that he was filing a completely honest report.

 

“You do know that is probably the only reason why most of the admiralty agreed to stay hands off for now. Because of that decision, we know that you can separate the personal from the professional. Actually, that’s why I’m telling you this instead of James. If Jim knew about this, I would literally be pulling him off of X right now.” Spock deliberately kept his face neutral at her words.

Due to the exact nature of the procedure used to “heal” James after his “radiation exposure” only Admirals Chan and Pike knew the actual details surrounding those incidents, including Spock’s attempt to murder Khan with his bare hands upon a garbage ship.

“James is our Captain and should be made aware of this.” Spock told her not wanting to voice the fact that he believes James may be able to be less partial than him. When it comes to the people Spock cares about, he is aware that his decisions are not always the most logical.

 

“Not right now. You and your girlfriend are assigned to me.” Admiral Rodriguez said sternly.

 

"You are not going to march into X’s office and punch him out. You are going to play the game. Which means, tomorrow when your girlfriend is meeting with the therapist, you will be at the meeting that Admiral Chan asked me to hold regarding redesigning of various simulations to create more effective cadets.” Spock understood her order clearly. She meant he could not tell either of his lovers that night or in the morning of Admiral Rodriguez’s suspicions regarding Admiral X. That was why Spock was impatiently watching the clock as he waited to leave or at the very least get another response from James. At this point, even obscene text messages would have been a welcome distraction, but he has not received any more messages from James since he received a picture of James sucking whip cream and blueberry syrup off of Nyota' fingers during breakfast. (Spock decided it was in his best interest not to ask why Jim was able to take such a picture.)

 

At least James did know about the meeting. They spoke about it the night before, during what Jim referred to as happy make out time. Jim wasn’t surprised because Admiral Chan contacted James personally after his successful “reprogramming” of the exam the year before to discuss the merits of an exam that students walked in to knowing that they would not succeed. According to James, she wanted to change it last year, but because of Admiral Marcus she could not. It made sense to Jim that she was tried to push through the curriculum change as fast as she could while everybody else was distracted by the investigation of her predecessor.

 

Of course, not everybody was very happy with the possibility of change. X was not at the meeting, but several of his subordinates were. The incident last year with James hacking into the Kobayashi Maru was mentioned multiple times for multiple reasons. The one brought up most often was due to their personal relationship Spock should not be a member of the team redesigning the test. Now he understands why Admiral Rodriguez gave him a long list of things he was not allowed to mention during this meeting including anything related to James reprogramming of the exam.

 

As he sat there in the meeting counting down the minutes until he could actually leave, he wondered if the sole purpose of this exercise was to elicit an emotional response from him. Thankfully, the meeting ended before he decided that the most logical course would be to strangle the man. He disliked anyone speaking about James in such a derogatory manner.

 

XXXXX

 

When he saw Nyota run out of Dr. Kim’s office, Jim knew he should have told her what was really going on instead of assuming it would be best to keep her in the dark about what Admiral X was really doing to the trio. When the admiralty decided that there personal relationship had no bearing on Jim being reinstated as Enterprise’s Captain, they thought they’d won the battle. X, however, was still fighting the war and had apparently changed his target to Nyota.

 

Moments after sending slightly dirty breakfast pictures involving him licking whipped cream off of their mutual girlfriend to Spock, he received an email from his ex. He let Jim know that Admiral X found out about Admiral Rodriguez's decision to have Nyota just go through anger management therapy and keep the entire incident an internal HR matter which wouldn’t even go into her permanent file. X was furious.

 

Jim's theory is that he wanted to use this against Jim somehow in his personal little war. Because of Admiral Rodriguez’s ruling X could not do that, so instead he decided to change which therapist Nyota would see. (Seriously, who the fuck decided to put Starfleet medical under the auspices of somebody that has no ethics whatsoever?) Jim is highly suspicious about how X knew about this because Rodriguez was keeping a close hold on the incident.

 

It was easy for Jim to see that this was another attempt by X to hurt him and possibly make him mad enough to resign. He knows that he should tell Spock and Nyota what was going on, but no one except Kim was completely aware of X’s tactics. That’s only because everything came out when his ex-boyfriend explained why he was turning over his care to Dr. Caraballo, despite the fact that X was having a total hissy fit about it. Kim was already a target as well because he reported several incidents of misconduct on X’s part which in his mind kept him from succeeding Admiral Marcus.

 

Jim thinks that this is laughable because he knows first year cadets who are more qualified for the upper levels of Starfleet but the idiot is taking the supposed slight seriously enough to give Dr. Kim patients that will lead to him losing his license if he actually treats them. Jim was the ultimate no-no because they’ve slept together and Jim should have been given over to someone else as soon as Dr. Kim requested it. (Jim is pretty sure that X knew about their relationship beforehand because X just happened to be the uncle of the bigot roommate. Jim was sure that Abrams told his uncle of Jim’s “deviant sexual behaviors” including the identity of the med student Jim was sleeping with at the time. Jim didn’t know any of this until that meeting with Kim a few weeks ago.)

 

X refused Kim’s request by playing the clearance card saying that national security trumps medical ethics. Jim did not buy this. First of all, X was unaware of some of the more “classified” parts of the Vengeance incident. Besides those directly involved, only three people in Starfleet know about Jim’s death: Admiral Chan, Admiral Nhi Pike and Dr. Kim. Second, they all know that X doesn’t give a damn about national security as long as he gets what he wants. Jim is smart enough to know that X was using the security clearance excuse to screw with those that oppose him. However, Jim and Dr. Kim are smarter than that and both could see that this latest stunt with Nyota had X’s name written all over it.

 

He didn’t exactly want to tell his girlfriend that she was being specifically targeted because X is a misogynistic prick and even in the 23rd century women are held to a different standard. As long as people are cool with the guy and alien thing, Jim is the man for screwing two people at the same time. Spock will experience some prejudice from certain bigot circles because he is taking human partners away from other humans, but that mindset is not as widely held as it used to be. Nyota is the one who’s going to be called a whore and X was of this mentality. He wished he had proof that the man set up the incident with Lieutenant Bailey, but he was in all likelihood taking advantage of convenient circumstances. The preconception is completely unfair to her, because between the two of them, he’s the one who really deserves that moniker.

 

He knows full well that Nyota can protect herself just as well as Spock, but she’s being attacked because of him. That means he needs to protect her and that means not telling her about what X is doing. (Also, he’s trying to protect her from being brought up on charges because she would try to kill X with her bare hands for fucking with them.) She doesn’t need anything else to worry about. Nasty phone calls from her prick father were enough for her to deal with.

 

He knows Nyota is a complete professional and she can handle one session with Dr. Kim until they can figure out a way out of this. Considering he just watched her run out of Dr. Kim’s office, Jim realized it may not be the case.

 

“What the hell did you say to her?” He yelled at Dr. Kim because it was obvious that a pissed off Nyota was totally his fault.

 

“Something that she wasn’t ready to hear yet,” Kim said shaking his head. “I can’t tell you more than that.”

 

“I’m her Captain!”

 

“No, you’re her boyfriend,” Kim retorted quickly in a voice that no one else in the room could hear, “and thanks to X trying to make me quit or have me do something that will make me lose my license, she’s my patient for the moment. I’m not going to betray her trust. You need to talk to her, preferably after she calms down. But you need to talk to her and ask her why she left.”

 

“I’ve known her long enough to figure that out on my own.” Jim actually discovered it was best to stay at least 100 m away from Nyota when she is pissed during their first year in the xenolinguistics club. Spock confirmed his observation the first time Jim ate all her favorite cookies without getting more.

 

“Considering you know her so well, did you think that it would have been a good idea to tell her I was the one meeting with her and explain why so I did not have to? That was the entire reason why I emailed you before the session.” Kim wasn’t really yelling at Jim, but that was because he was using his therapist voice.

 

“Why did Nyota not meet with Dr. Caraballo? Where is Nyota?” He heard Spock asked as he walked up beside him and Jim had to fight hard not to kiss him the human way. However, he was so sneaking in a Vulcan kiss. Of course, Doctor Kim rolled his eyes at that.

 

“Aren’t you supposed to be at the Kobayashi Maru rewrite hearings or whatever?” Jim asked as he pulled his hand away from Spock’s.

 

“The meeting ended early. Where is Nyota?” Spock asked again.

 

“Your girlfriend ended our session early which is her right. Let’s be honest, I’m not the best fit for her. There’s a reason why you’re not supposed to treat the partners of people you used to date.” Doctor Kim quipped. “And no, I’m not going to tell Admiral Rodriguez about this.”

 

“Then why were you seeing her?” Spock asked. At that moment, Jim knew that he probably should have informed Spock that X was still actively trying to fuck with Jim.”

 

“X found out that Rodriguez wasn’t going to play his game,” Kim started explaining to Spock, so Jim would not have to. “Instead of having the Lieutenant see Dr. Caraballo, who is actually qualified to handle this sort of thing, even though she can’t know everything related to the Vengeance incident X arrange for her to see Dr. Williams. The guy is a quack. I don’t know how he’s managed to keep his license. I’m positive that he’s broke the golden rule of psychiatry at least once.”

 

“To what golden rule are you referring?” Spock asked.

 

“Don’t fuck your patients and don’t treat people that you have fucked.” Jim supplied for the doctor which garnered him a glare.

 

“That’s essentially it, but with less vulgarity.”

 

“Yet, by treating James you yourself have violated this supposed golden rule,” Spock said pointedly.

 

“Jim and I were both cadets during the course of our sexual relationship. I was actually initially brought into examine you, not Jim, and I was completely unaware of his relationship to you at the time other than the fact that you served under him. Also, I was the only psychologist in Starfleet who had any hope of figuring out why you blacked out the entire time -- when Jim was -- that thing.” Kim started but then stopped himself abruptly. Great, even people he is not currently dating can’t talk about his death. It’s the one thing they don’t talk about.

 

“I can’t talk about this when we are in the middle of the hallway, it’s too classified.” At least Kim has a much better reason to not talk about it than his significant others.

 

“Once I started to hypothesize the real reason you lost consciousness, I tried to transfer the case to someone else, but -- can we please finish this conversation in my office? I really don’t want to be discussing this in the hallway.” Kim said just as several people in the room started looking at them strangely.

 

“I’m perfectly fine. I don’t have any secrets.” Jim said sharply.

 

“What about Dr. McCoy’s ‘special radiation treatment’ or as I like to refer to it ‘the reason why doctor shouldn’t treat their friends’”? Okay, he had a very good point since that was the most need to know top-secret no non-Federation thing in Starfleet history. And the woman staring at him obviously does not have a need to know, even if she did have a TS clearance.

 

“Good point.” James said as they follow the doctor into his office.

 

“Hey, layoff Bones! He is the entire reason I am still alive.” Jim set the moment the door shut behind him.

 

“He is the reason why I’m in the middle of this ethical nightmare. I should not see Jim in a professional capacity. However, I am the only therapist with a security clearance high enough to know exactly what Doctor McCoy had to do to revive Jim. Honestly, I don’t want anyone else to know what happened, especially someone with the ethics of Dr. Williams, who happens to be in your least favorite Admiral’s back pocket. What Doctor McCoy did crossed every single line possible and the technique he used to revive you should never become public knowledge. Do you have any idea how many of my colleagues would want to put you under a microscope now?” Okay, now Doctor Kim was screaming.

 

“So he should adjust let me die for the sake of ethics. That is complete bull…” Jim started to yell but Spock cut him off by grabbing his hand.

 

“I’m not saying that.” Kim argued back. “Honestly, I probably would have done the same, which is why I could never treat you and literally begged Dr. Caraballo to take over, even though X was playing his usual games.”

 

“What games?” Great, Kim said too much and now, Spock was asking more questions.

 

“You didn’t tell him?” Kim asked giving Jim the look.

 

“What did you not tell me?” Spock gave Jim an even more menacing version of it.

 

“Admiral X is waging a private little war against us, but we’re not his only targets,” Jim started to explain everything and Spock only looked mildly upset. (He only raised one eyebrow, but he did keep touching Jim’s hand throughout the conversation.)

 

“I do not find this behavior uncharacteristic for Admiral X.” Spock said after Jim was done. “Being the child of an ambassador, I am well versed in these types of political games.” Spock was currently using his ‘you should have told me before’ voice. If they weren’t already not having sex due to medical orders, Jim wouldn’t be getting any for at least two weeks.

 

“The incident two days ago between Nyota and her coworker was engineered for the sole purpose of eliciting an emotional response from Nyota by Admiral X for reasons known only to him. However, Admiral Rodriguez chose to handle the situation internally and therefore his purpose did not succeed.” And Spock would not be getting any for a month for not telling him that.

 

“I should have been aware that you were already suspicious of Admiral X.” Spock finished which just made Jim even more annoyed.

 

“Oh don’t you dare take that fucking tone with me. You didn’t tell me that the whole incident with Ny and the founding member of ‘Linguistics for Intolerance’ was some set up by X to get Starfleet to reconsider everything,” Jim practically yelled at Spock.

 

“Admiral Rodriguez told me not to.” Spock explained glaring at him. “You did not tell me that you were conspiring with your former significant other to take out Admiral X as you would say.”

 

“Really, after the volcano incident, you would think you’d learn not to blindly follow orders.” The moment he said it, Jim regretted it. It was a low blow. Spock was already on the other side of the room, now looking more wounded then pissed.

 

“Shit, Spock. You are well aware I’m a complete asshole.” Jim said, moving to his boyfriend.

 

I wasn’t deliberately keeping this from you. But you should have told - you are just so frustrating – really—just-- I don’t even—Spock…” Jim spluttered as he tried to grab Spock’s hand.

 

“First, take a deep breath and calm down. You’re not even talking incomplete sentences.” The Doctor said motioning for Jim to sit down.

 

“Second, the only jealous Vulcan I want to deal with is my husband. Tone it down.” He said pointing to Spock to sit down.

 

“You are married to a Vulcan?” Spock asked incredulously, for him.

 

“Yes. Do you have anything disrespectful to say about that considering you’re bonded to a human?” Kim said defensively.

 

“That would be hypocritical.”

 

“I am discovering that’s pretty common on Vulcan, and it almost makes me happy I will never get to meet my in-laws.” The doctor mumbled under breath.

 

“Great!” Jim said as that particular truth crashed into him. “I’m going to have to deal with his father. Do you have any idea how bad that is going to be? The last time we saw each other, Spock was trying to kill me.”

 

That statement resulted in the doctor just staring for several moments unable to respond.

 

“I’m kind of glad that ethically I cannot be your doctor. I don’t think I can deal with this on a regular basis. That being said, you guys need to talk to each other and I don’t mean yelling or having angry sex.” Kim said as he placed his head in his hands.

 

“Do you think we would be this high strung if we could have sex?” Jim asked incredulously. “We can’t have sex. Dr. McCoy said no. It would be so much easier if we could have sex. Sex I can do. It’s relationships I fucking suck at. We are fighting because I am an ass and Nyota ran away. I’m not good at dating one person, why did I think I could do two at the same time?”

 

“In your next session with Dr. Caraballo, you may want to mention that.” He sighed and Spock grabbed Jim's hand again.

 

“However, since she’s not here, let me give you some advice, not as a physician, but as sort of a friend and fellow person married to a Vulcan or in your case, Spock, as someone who has actually dated Jim Kirk.” They both just nodded their heads in agreement.

 

“First, don’t trust Rodriguez. She may not be trying to actively get you out of Starfleet like X, but she’s not your friend. She has her own reasons for doing anything she does and her advice to not tell Jim about Nyota being purposely set up was bad. There’s a good chance that you guys may be getting a five-year mission, if X doesn’t actually ruin things for you. That means you have to work together, despite all the personal things going on.”

 

“We work great together.” “We have excellent communication.” He and Spock said simultaneously. Dr. Kim looks like he was trying not to cry or laugh at that moment. Jim is not sure which.

 

“I would mention the incident that began this entire mess, but I have a patient in 10 minutes and you really need to find your girlfriend. My second piece of advice is that you guys talk to each other about everything - especially the incident.”

 

“That’s why I’m seeing Dr. Caraballo and talking to elder Selek. It’s best... I mean I don’t want to burden…” Jim started to say, but he was cut off by Spock’s lips on his. It was a quick kiss but it is enough to get him to stop babbling.

 

“Neither I nor Nyota see you as a burden because we love you. I know you have nightmares. I know you blame yourself for Admiral Christopher Pike’s death. I blame myself as well.” Spock told him as he pulled away from his lips.

 

“Don’t. It wasn’t your fault. I was the one in charge. Whatever happened, it was my responsibility and I completely fucked up. I fucked up so spectacularly in so many ways, starting with letting you do something that…” Remembering that weren’t alone, Jim decided not to complete that sentence.

 

“If I didn’t fuck up, Chris would’ve never had to save my ass and he would’ve never been in that room, therefore, his wife would not be giving birth to another child who’s going to grow up without a da...” Halfway for the word Spock’s mouth was on his again.

 

“Aren’t you going to say anything about him kissing me to get me to shut up?” Jim asked as soon as Spock stopped because they both needed to breathe. “Seriously, are you going to do this every time we end up arguing on the bridge?”

 

“I will employ any method necessary.” Spock said sharply.

 

“I now have another patient arriving in five minutes and his technique did put an end to your self-deprecation. However, I will schedule an appointment for you with Dr. Caraballo tomorrow at 9 AM.”

 

“That’s so unfair,” Jim lamented as he was pushed out of the room with Spock. Just as they were out the door, Jim’s communicator chirped.

 

“That was Bones.” Jim said, looking up from his device. “He says that he’s going to drop Nyota off at the house when she is less likely to stab us with her heels.” The scary thing was that was Bones’ exact wording in his text message.

 

“Then I suggest we go home to wait for her.” Spock said, grabbing his hand and he didn’t care that Lieutenant Bailey went apoplectic due to the handholding. Apparently, she was the 11 o'clock.

        


	7. Trust Me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Love is not about diamonds or roses or even good sex. It’s about trust. Trust is a major component of all relationships. But in polyamorous relationships, it is one of the most important components if not the most important component. If your relationship is to work, you must trust this person or rather persons, not only with your life but with your heart.
> 
> Chapter 1 of The Idiot’s Guide to Multi-species Polyamorous Relationships, revised fifth edition

 

“I really shouldn’t be eating this.” Nyota said eyeing the slice of pizza dubiously. She was now sitting across from her new boyfriend’s best friend and the guy responsible for him not being dead after she literally ran into him. She was crying at the time and cursing idiot psychiatrists, meddling admirals and boyfriends that force you to see them. (Okay somewhere in her tirade she cursed Tiffany, her father, and Admiral Moron. She was angry at a lot of people including herself.) He whisked her away for junk food and coffee without saying another word.

 

“I don’t think either of your boyfriends are going to care if you gain a couple of pounds. Jim actually has a thing for curves and Spock would be a horrible Vulcan if he was attracted to anything other than your mind.” She was halfway tempted to mention that Spock was very partial to her breasts and Jim’s ass but they were in public.

 

“You’re a doctor; you’re not supposed to encourage me to eat stuff like this.” She said, putting the slice back down on her plate without taking a bite. “I had a giant pancake breakfast with Jim less than three hours ago.” Also, her therapy session took away any appetite she did have. The fact that they were sitting in the pizza place where this whole mess began just made her even less hungry if such a thing were possible.

 

“Well, at least somebody remember that I am a damn doctor and not a Starfleet robot or relationship counselor.” Leonard snarked.

 

She felt like he was there in the role of relationship counselor, but she didn’t say anything. She chose to take a drink of her double chocolate mocha instead. Jim was the one who turned her on to the really sweet coffees.

 

“You’re much too snarky for that.” She smirked back.

 

“Also, I know about breakfast. Your boyfriend, the one without the stick up his ass, sent me a picture of him licking whipped cream off of your neck. Nice hickey by the way.”

 

Okay, he had to be joking, because Jim did not bite her that hard. They barely did anything, even though the restaurant was completely deserted. They were trying to keep the fact that he was her -- can you call somebody a lover if you haven’t moved past the kissing yet? Then she remembered who spent a good 15 minutes on her neck recently. Spock gave her a hickey and she didn’t even think to look. He’s never done that before. Although with Jim around, he has been a little bit more aggressive in bed. She likes it.

 

“Do I even want to know why Jim sent you that picture?” She asked, sighing. This wasn’t the place to let him know that Spock really was kinkier than you would ever expect him to be.

 

Instead of answering he passed his communicator to her so she could see the text message that Jim sent him this morning. Underneath the image was the caption “Can we please have sex now? Are you trying to kill me via blue balls?”

 

“Oh god, he really would send you a message like that.” She laughed.

 

“I got another one a few days earlier with a similar caption, this time under an image of the hobgoblin looking very debauched.”

 

“I doubt it since were not allowed to do debauched. Seriously, it’s been almost 2 months. If Jim can sit through a boring as hell briefing with the idiots that be or spend all day looking over blueprints for the Enterprise reconstruction, then I think I can give him a hand job without him ending up in the emergency room again.” She said bluntly.

 

“I don’t know. Considering it was making out that landed Jim in the emergency room just a few weeks ago?” The doctor quipped. They were never going to live down that allergy incident.

 

“You do know that we don’t even kiss him after we eat something that he could be allergic to without using mouthwash now?” She explained.

 

“See this is why I think you’re good for him. You keep Jim from doing stupid things.” Leonard absolutely loves the fact that she’s Jim’s girlfriend. He’s still not entirely pleased with Spock, though. She knows that Jim and Leonard have talked about this, but it was more like they’ve agreed to disagree.

 

“Please, that’s mostly Spock.” She said, giving all credit to Spock. He’s the more nurturing one in the relationship, bizarrely enough. “I’m just here for backup.”

 

“I don’t believe that, but I’m not the hobgoblin’s biggest fan.” That was the understatement of the millennium.

 

“I am aware of that.” She said bluntly.

 

“Well, it’s a little hard to be completely okay with your friend dating a man who practically choked him to death.”

 

With that admission, Leonard’s attitude made much more sense to Nyota.

 

“First of all, unlike actual victims of domestic violence, Jim was deliberately goading Spock to hurt him.” She said defending Spock. “I’m not saying this as an excuse to absolve Spock of his behavior, but he was in a very bad place and was not in control of himself. The psychic backlash from experiencing billions of Vulcans dying was catastrophic. Spock was a mess for weeks after that.”

 

In some regards, he’s not back to the way he was before. Spock used to smile more. He also used to make more snide comments. Now that Jim is with them, those behaviors are starting to happen more frequently in spite of having to deal with the mess of the Vengeance incident. However, she has a feeling that if Jim and Spock were not together now, she would be reliving those dark days after Amanda’s death once more.

 

“Finally, I just want to reiterate that during the entire course of our relationship, Spock has never laid a hand on me. Therefore, I doubt that he will physically assault Jim outside of a sparring match.”

 

“How do I know you’re telling the truth? Do you have any idea how many times I heard something like that from a woman who showed up in my office with injuries from 'walking into a door'?”

 

“I doubt it was just women. If Spock did lay a hand on me, he would have ended up with a knife in the stomach and I don’t care that he’s probably six times stronger than me.” She told him firmly.

 

“I wouldn’t be surprised. I heard what you did to the Klingons.” Leonard said grabbing another slice of pizza.

 

At that point, their server came to refill Leonard's water. She decided to order a pizza and other goodies to take home. She was going to need an 'I’m sorry I ran out on therapy' present because she just knew Jim was going to be spending hours convincing Admiral Rodriguez not to be mad at her for walking out of her Starfleet mandated therapy.

 

“Everybody heard what I did to the Klingons. Contrary to what everybody thinks, I would never be in a relationship that I did not want to be in especially an abusive one.” That’s what irritated her most about her father’s accusations. He was acting like it was Spock who forced her into this arrangement.

 

“Why do I have a feeling that assumption is coming up a lot?” He said taking a drink.

 

“I’ve heard it from at least seven people in the last three days including my asshole father. He thinks I’m deluding myself by staying with someone who wants to date other people and that I should cut my losses. My father is also convinced that Spock does not or rather cannot love me, because if he’s with Jim, then that means he’s gay. He doesn’t get that…” She doesn’t even know how to articulate what her father doesn’t realize. The actual conversation with her father deteriorated in to lots of cursing in at least four different languages. She was kind of shocked how much Swahili she actually remembered during the heat of their argument.

 

“You’re in love with two people and you’re not doing this for Spock, you’re doing it for yourself.” Leonard supplied for her. Nyota does not bother to ask him why he knows that she is in love with Jim and Spock. If anybody knows her as well as her boyfriends, it is going to be the man in front of her.

 

They are definitely friends. He brought her chocolate and other goodies when she was practically living in Jim’s hospital room. It’s likely that her being there almost as much as Spock gave him a good idea of what her feelings for Jim really are. It was just she would really like to tell Jim that she was in love with him before another person figured it out, even if that person was a Jim Kirk expert.

 

“Exactly,” Nyota told him, because there’s no point of lying to the doctor. “But my father thinks I’m delusional and clueless and he doesn’t even know about the bonding thing. I think if he did he would be even more anti-Spock.” She doesn’t tell him that Jim and Spock being bonded to each other when she and Spock are not compatible does not bother her, because he’s going to see through that faster than Dr. Kim did.

 

“Anti-Spock or anti-Jim and Spock?” He asked.

 

“I don’t think he sees a difference.” She does not. So why should he? “Dad sees it as me giving my boyfriend a free pass to cheat on me, not that I’m dating both guys.” Okay, so she may have got a little too angry at her father and said something about how she enjoys watching the two of them together, but she wasn’t going to tell Leonard about that outburst.

 

“He doesn’t care about what I feel, he never has. He says that he’s afraid that, I’m going to be crying on his shoulder when I divorce my husband for doing essentially what he did to mom. Personally, I think my dad’s just worried about me crying on his shoulder, because he doesn’t have time for his children. Trying to bring about intergalactic peace*, yes. Being emotionally available for his children, no. Not anymore, at least, not since step-mom number one.”

 

“I don’t think it counts as cheating when you’re actively dating both parties involved.” He said with a small snicker.

 

Thankfully, he didn’t address all the daddy issues that were in her earlier statement and she is well aware that everything she just said was teeming with daddy issues, even without the color commentary of Dr. Kim. “No, I don’t want to know details about your sex life.” He added as an afterthought.

 

“I have no details to give, because thanks to you I have no sex life. If I was actually having sex with Jim and Spock right now, I wouldn’t be so stressed out. If I wasn’t so stressed, I would have never thrown a PADD at the woman or rather the piece of wall next to her head.” She practically yelled at him, before adding, “Yes, I missed on purpose.”

 

“I thought that you did.” Leonard smirked at her. “Also, I think the lack of sex is the least of the things contributing to why you resorted to physical violence.”

 

“Do you know how annoying it is for everybody to call you a slut when you’re not actually having sex?” She quipped.

 

“I think it would be annoying regardless, but I know you well enough to know that wasn’t the only reason why you did what you did.” She really does hate that he knows her so well. When did they become friends like this?

 

“Okay, I had lots of reasons to throw my PADD at the wicked bitch and none of them are related to watching Jim-to witnessing what happened in the warp core.” She quickly corrected herself remembering that she’s not allowed to talk about Jim dying nor does she want to. She doesn’t want to think about it ever again. The debriefing with Chan, was enough to last her a lifetime.

 

“I’m not saying that’s the only issue but…” He started to argue, but she cut him off.

 

“It is not an issue.” She practically yelled. “I have other things to worry about. First of all, she tried to get Jim and Spock kicked out of Starfleet by giving info to Admiral Moron. Because that didn’t work, she is now actively trying to get me kicked out of the linguistics department because my ‘deviant behavior’ makes me a bad example to impressionable youth.” That comment got her a snort from the doctor.

 

“Is she aware of all the orgies and poly relationships that happen in the dorms at Starfleet Academy?” He wasn’t even joking that much. Just like every other college campus in the universe, there is a lot of sex going on of every variation imaginable, especially considering the Academy’s diverse student body from all over the galaxy with lots of different sexual practices.

 

“I doubt it, because I’m sure she was never invited.” She joked. “She told my mother and my father that I’m perverse because I have two boyfriends and called me things that my mom refuses to repeat. My father obviously agrees with Tiffany.” She told him bitterly playing with her untouched slice of pizza. She realized she wasn’t hungry at all.

 

“As a fellow father, I am contractually obligated to mention that this may just be a case of nobody’s good enough for my daughter.” She laughs at that. Sometimes it’s hard for her to see him as a dad and at others it’s very easy. There are days when he really is the crew’s surrogate father and other days when he’s just as crazy as the rest of them.

 

“Considering some of my father’s other out of touch comments, I doubt it.”

 

“It’s probably best that you don’t tell me what those are.” Considering how overprotective of Jim Leonard McCoy truly is it probably was. "What about your mom?”

 

“I’m not sure. She wasn’t happy that she found out from Tiffany and her least favorite Starfleet admiral, but she didn’t say anything about the fact my boyfriend decided to get a new boyfriend without actually ending our relationship.”

 

“No parent would be happy finding something like that from a work colleague.” Okay, she can grudgingly acknowledge to herself, at least, that he had a good point.

 

“It wasn’t like I was not going to tell her.” Nyota told him defensively. “I was just waiting until I knew things were solid. I probably would’ve told her after we started, you know, actually having sex. It hasn’t even been two months yet. I waited three months before I told her about Spock.” Before him nothing ever lasted longer than a few weeks.

 

“It’s been over a year, if you’re counting from when you guys started dancing around each other.” Leonard snickered. “I think the fact that you three are living together makes the relationship pretty solid.”

 

“Maybe,” she said simply, not wanting him to know that a part of her agreed with him. “My Mom did send me a copy of _The Idiots Guide to Multi-Species Polyamorous Relationships_. I don’t know whether to see that as her approving or if she’s already convinced that this is going to be a disaster.”

 

“I’ve only met your mom once or twice when she was a guest lecturer at the Academy, but she seems like a smart woman and so I’m going to take her gesture as her being supportive of you. She raised you, so she can’t be that evil.” Leonard said being all too reasonable.

 

“Aunt Sarah did most of the heavy lifting.” She joked, but thinking back on it now even if her mom was light-years away, she always seemed more available than her father who was just in the next room. She could tell her mom anything, even if it was the fact that she decided that her relationship with Spock would only survive if Jim was part of it and it was okay because somehow she fallen in love with Jim too. Maybe that was the whole reason she was upset about finding out about the whole thing from Tiffany.

 

“It’s just I hate therapists and self-help books. I hate people trying to analyze me or maybe judging me is the more appropriate phrase.” She told him honestly.

 

“So that explains why you ran out of your therapy appointment cursing everyone.” Leonard said, in all seriousness. She knew he would get back to that eventually.

 

“No, I ran out of there because Dr. Kim is an idiot. He believes half of my problems are related to Jim dying and the other half are related to my parent’s divorce.” She was hoping the doctor would say that was ridiculous, but instead he stayed completely quiet.

 

“You agree with him?” She asked.

 

“I think you don't necessarily have issues with your parents’ divorce, but the whole thing made you relationship wary. Just like the whole situation with my ex makes me afraid to date again.”

 

“And yet, Jim is crashing your dates with Carol.” When Nyota says her name, he smiles. Usually, the only time Leonard McCoy truly smiles is when he actually gets to talk to his daughter.

 

“I think it’s his revenge for the no sex thing.” Leonard joked.

 

“If you would just lift the ‘no sex thing’, this would not be a problem.” She told him again.

 

“Contrary to what Jim and you believe, being able to have sex is not going to magically fix all your problems. They’re all still going to be there after you cum.” Leonard told her bluntly.

 

“Other than everybody judging me and certain members of Starfleet actively trying to screw with my life, things are good.” She told him, but he just gave her his “you cannot fool me’ look.

 

“Yeah and about two months ago you watched your…"

 

“We can’t talk about it. Security issues.” She interrupted him.

 

“No, we can’t talk about how I brought Jim back. However, we can talk about how he got that way.” He said again way too bluntly for her taste.

 

“I watched him die and then I watched Spock fall apart,” she yelled which caused every single person in the restaurant to look at her. “Do you know it is the worst feeling in the world to realize you’re in love with somebody the moment they take their last breath?” Unwanted angry tears she couldn’t hold back any longer were sliding down her cheeks.

 

“That’s when you figured it out.” Leonard did not even say it as a question.

 

“That’s when Spock figured it out or maybe that was the moment he stopped lying to himself.” She told him wiping the tears out of her eyes. “Me, I’m not entirely sure. Maybe, I don’t want to talk about it.”

 

“You know you do not want to talk about a lot of things. And it’s fine.” He said acting like he was going to drop it, but she should know better. “You don’t need to talk to me about these things, but you do need to talk to Jim and Spock about them - especially what happened in the warp core.”

 

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

 

“Do you think you’re the only one who is having problems with this stuff? Do you have any idea how many people I’ve had to refer to therapy for PTSD?”

 

“Jim has nightmares. He has problems, I don’t. I am fine.” She told him again. Although, even she was starting to believe those were just empty words.

 

“I think I’m starting to hate that word as much as the hobgoblin.” He said taking a drink of water.

 

“Unlike Jim when he’s lying about having a concussion or any other malady, I actually am fine.” She reiterated again.

 

“No, you’re not. Perfectly fine people don’t throw things at their office mates or spend the entire 15 minute ride here cursing out their therapist and father. They also don’t change the subject any time you mention their boyfriends very near-death experience.”

 

“Maybe…” She started to say in her defense, but she really didn’t know how to defend herself, because maybe he was right.

 

“I know you’re scared and you don’t want to actually share these things with other people, but if this relationship is actually going to work you are really going to have to talk to your boyfriends, both of them. More than that, you’re going to have to trust each other with these deep dark secrets.” He paused for a moment and reached out for her hand. “Do you know why my marriage fell apart?” He asked, abruptly.

 

“Because you caught her fucking someone else?” She responded flippantly. “That little secret comes out every time you have more than three or four shots.”

 

“Darlin’, it was more complicated than that. After my dad died, I retreated into myself. I wasn’t ready to talk about it. I threw myself into work and halfway moved into the bottle. I was a fucking mess.” Okay, this was part of the story that she never heard before.

 

“How does this relate to her cheating on you?” She asked directly. “I think I heard this story before when my mom tried to explain why dad knocking up some bimbo was all her fault.”

 

“Because I didn’t trust her enough to tell her what the hell was going on, she assumed that I trusted someone else. At the same time, she didn’t trust me enough to believe me when I said that I was at work, I was really at work.” He explained.

 

“She assumed that you were screwing around first?”

 

“Exactly,”

 

“You do realize being a closed off bastard does not give her permission to sleep around on you, just like my mom having an off planet assignment did not give my dad the right to sleep with future step mom number one?” She asked.

 

“The infidelity was a symptom of a bigger problem.” Leonard clarified. “We stopped talking to each other. We stopped trusting each other. When that happened, everything else fell apart.”

 

“You think the same thing is going to happen with the three of us?” She asked worriedly.

 

“Not if you let both of them in.” He said wisely.

 

“Maybe you’re right.” She sighed. He squeezed her hand and let go.

 

“As an incentive, if you go home and talk to your boyfriends about what's really going on in your head, I may be willing to let up on some of Jim’s restrictions.” As soon as he said the words her face lit up like a five-year-old at Christmas.

 

“Are we talking about those restrictions?” She asked, still grinning like an idiot.

 

“Only if you go talk things out with your boyfriends and trust me, I will know if you don’t.” Considering he was Jim’s best friend and Jim had no filter, he probably would.

 

“You win," she sighed. "Although, let’s pick up some alcohol. I’m going to need all the help I can get to get through this conversation.”

 

XXXXXX

One of the advantages of James recovering is that they are allowed the privilege to work from home. Now that the hearings regarding the Vengeance incident were over, James’ major responsibility is to oversee the redesign and repairs of the Enterprise. James can just as easily approved schematics from their bedroom as he can from his office at Starfleet HQ. Also, considering the fact that James does not like to go anywhere near the section of the building where Admiral Christopher Pike died, it might be better for his emotional recovery to not be physically in the building. Although they were not planning to return to the office this afternoon, Spock was relieved to receive a message from Admiral Pike, telling them not to return to the Starfleet offices now.

 

“Okay, it’s good to know that we’re ordered not to be at work instead of just playing hooky, so we can make Nyota not mad at us. Bones is giving her pizza and coffee according to his latest text message.” James said lying down on the couch.  “I’m glad we thought to pick up the good cookies before coming home.”

 

"I believe that term merely refers to schoolchildren.” Spock remarked dryly.

 

“I love it when you play dumb regarding colloquialisms. You are so snarky when you want to be.” James said, giving him a quick peck on the lips. “I’d rather be home anyway. After this morning, I really didn’t want to sit in my deceased mentor’s office, especially since it happens to be next door to Admiral X. I may be tempted to deck the guy.”

 

Due to the rebuilding of the destroyed section of the building and as well as Admiral Pike’s refusal to occupy her deceased husband's former office, he and James were currently sharing the space. It was supposed to be temporary, but Spock was certain that this was another mind game instigated by Admiral X (especially considering the fact that he occupies the office next door).

 

“You dislike working in that office because you blame yourself for Christopher’s death.” Spock said bluntly.

 

“See this is why I’m the one who sends out the ‘I’m sorry your son or daughter died’ emails. I am so going to have to teach you how to soften the blow.” James said, using humor to deflect from his true feelings. This was obvious to Spock due to his boyfriend’s fake smile.

 

“I had to send several of those messages when you were…” Spock started but was unable to finish. Maybe James was not the only one avoiding certain things.

 

“Say it Spock! I was dead.” James said, closing his eyes. "I died and you watched it happen and I was fucking terrified. And sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night thinking this is all a dream and shit-- we really don’t talk about this.”

 

James is correct, they do not talk about James dying. Spock has only spoken about the subject a handful of times and the majority of those instances have been at the Vengeance incident debriefing. Thanks to the classified nature of the method used to bring James back from the dead, he rarely had to discuss it at all. Actually, he was not allowed to.

 

“I hate when Kim is right. He’s such a bastard about it.” Spock agreed with his boyfriend wholeheartedly about that.

 

“You do not want to discuss it when you wake up from a nightmare. You never tell me the subject matter, but I am certain your dreams are related to your death.” The fact that James does not make eye contact with him leads Spock to believe that his hypothesis is accurate.

 

“Neither do you.” Jim shot back. “You have nightmares that you don’t want to talk about either and don’t say Vulcans do not dream because you are my special Vulcan snowflake. You are 100% uniquely you and that’s what I love about you.” James kissed him once more. This kiss was slightly deeper than the one previously. Actually, this kiss involves significant amounts of groping and the use of tongues.

 

“You are trying to distract me from the conversation.” Spock said pulling away from the kiss reluctantly.

 

“You can’t blame a guy for trying.” James pouted. “I’ve had nightmares for forever. I lived through genocide. I saw my mom raped in front of me.” Spock just wrapped an arm around him. Before this, Spock only knew the barest details about that time in James’ life. He knew it was a highly unpleasant experience, but he was unaware of the severity of it.

 

“Waking up terrified is not a new thing. It was just before dying, my worst nightmares were about getting a phone call from my mom’s doctor telling me that she is either killed herself or she doesn’t remember me at all. Now I dream about you burning in the volcano, Chris dying in your arms, and Nyota getting gutted by the Klingons right in front of us. I’m a little broken. It’s no wonder I have a therapist and a mind healer.” James joked.

 

“You’re not broken.” Spock said, giving him another kiss on the lips as he held him tighter. “I still dream about my mother’s death.” He confessed. "Now I dream about watching you die or Khan breaking Nyota’s neck when she came down to keep me from killing him.” Spock closed his eyes. He hates that dream.

 

“You really tried to kill him?” James asked surprised. Apparently, that detail was omitted from even the classified accounts of what happened.

 

“As you are aware, I do not remember anything between watching you die and you coming back to life. According to Nyota, this is what happened. I am uncertain as to how my mind can place Nyota in that scenario.” He confessed to his boyfriend.

 

“Because the mind is pretty fucked up,” James responded. “I didn’t watch you nearly sacrifice yourself to a volcano, but my mind has come up with a pretty convincing image of what happened. Don’t you dare do that to us again. Just no.” In his arms, he can actually feel James tremble.

 

“That is a hypocritical thing to say, considering that you sacrificed your life in the warp core, just days later.”

 

“I’m so signing you up for some classes that teach you how to filter. Now that will be stuck here for the next year.” Jim said shaking his head. The words reminded Spock of the conversation he had with Christopher Pike months earlier. “I didn’t have a choice Spock. If I didn’t do something, we were all going to die.”

 

“My sacrifice…” He started, but James cut him off with a finger on his lips.

 

“It’s not the same thing. It is nowhere near the same thing. You were going to sacrifice yourself for some stupid rule and you were acting like it was no big deal at all. It was like you didn’t care at all that you were leaving us. Do you have any idea how much you hurt me and Nyota?”

 

At the time, Spock did not entirely comprehend the true depth of his actions, but that was before watching James died in front of him. “I couldn’t just leave you there and fucking idiotic Starfleet regulations be damned. You were --and then….” James was shaking again and his eyes were moist.

 

“In Admiral Christopher Pike’s office, you said that I threw you under the bus.” Spock said wiping James tears with his fingers. He can feel James’ pain. It is sharp and consuming. He can also feel vast amounts of guilt radiating off his boyfriend.

 

“I shouldn’t have said that.” James said apologetically. “I was being an asshole. I shouldn’t have expected you to lie for me especially without me talking to you about it. Kim was right. We do need to talk to each other about the ship related things, if nothing else. Otherwise, we are going to give X a really good reason to put us on separate ships. Honestly, half of the shit I spat at you that day was me being angry because they were taking you away from me. The rest of that was because I am absolute shit at expressing my feelings.” James finished with another sigh.

 

“Considering I have lied for you once before, it is reasonable to assume that I would do so again.” Spock said trying to make James feel better, but instead he gave Spock a very perplexed expression.

 

“You never lied on a mission report. So again, why the hell did I think you would cover up the volcano incident? See this is why it was all on me.”

 

“I did lie before. I covered up the exact sensitivity of what you referred to as the "lizard girl" incident.” Spock told James matter-of-factly.

 

“Wait, really?” James asked slightly shocked.

 

“I do not lie.” Spock responded simply.

 

“You just admit it that you actually lied to Starfleet for me that means that you do lie. Also what you did is not even in the same league as lying about a mission to cover up a violation of the Prime Directive. I’m sorry I even expected that of you.” It was at that moment, Spock decided to tell James everything.

 

“Admiral Pike detected the inconsistencies in my report and confronted me on my feelings for you. He ordered me to stop pulling your pigtails and I quote "Figure out what's going on between you two, but don't let it interfere with the ship."

 

“Chris really would say that. Of course, he saw what was going on between us before we did.” James said with a sad smile.

 

“I had considered sending a report where I did not include our violation of the prime directive.” Spock started to explain.

 

“That was not an “our” situation. I was the one who violated it.” James interrupted again.

 

“Because of something I did. It was our violation.”

 

“The admiralty didn’t see it that way.” James mumbled under breath.

 

“I am uncertain of that. I consider transferring me away from you and Nyota as a punishment.”

 

"You say the sweetest things sometimes.” Jim said, giving him a quick kiss.

 

"I reported my actions because I felt not doing so would be me allowing my feelings for you to influence my job. Because I gave a completely factual report without even bothering to add context we were recalled to earth. Because we were recalled…”

 

“Don’t even think that way.” James said, placing his fingers back on Spock’s lips.

 

“You and I were trying not to allow our emotions to cloud our judgment, but that’s exactly what we did in the end. It feels like every single decision we made was influenced by emotions. It doesn’t matter. Chris is still dead…”

 

“If I did not allow…” Spock interjected.

 

"You’re not blaming – that fuck up is all on me.” At this point, things deteriorated in to what Jim refers to as a make out session. Although things did not progress beyond kissing, James shirt was currently in pieces on the floor of the living room.

 

“God, you and I are so screwed up.” James said, once they broke apart "We can even get through one conversation about keeping our personal feelings out of our work relationship. I don’t see how anyone, let alone Nyota can put up with us.”

 

“I have contemplated this as well. She does not like it when I respond overly logical to a situation.” Spock retorted.

 

“No, she doesn’t like it when you act like you don’t feel anything when we both know that you do.”

 

“I am not the only one who puts on façades.” Spock said in his own defense.

 

“Maybe, but your worse,” James side. “I only put up with it because I am in love with you, but in a good way. I’m not sure why she does it.” Spock does not either. He was certain that she would abandon the current arrangement, when she discovered that he created a psychic bond with James when he was supposed to be exclusively devoted to her.

 

“I do wonder like when you make me see your ex-boyfriend in a professional capacity. Personally, I think it’s the view or maybe the fact I’m in love with both of you.” Nyota said walking into the living room carrying pizza and several other food items.

 

“How long were you there -- Spock what did you do to my shirt?” Jim asked, picking up the tattered item from the floor. Spock barely remembered removing it.

 

“Long enough to realize I should never leave you two unsupervised. Seriously, you ripped off his shirt? You are the reason why I don’t buy really nice bras anymore. Vulcan strength and frustration with clothing is a really bad combination.” She joked, placing her food on a nearby table. However, there is some truth to her statement.

 

“Did you just say that you’re in love with me?” James asked slightly bewildered finally, picking up on her earlier words. Nyota’s response was to walk over to James and kiss him.

 

“It was one of my therapy epiphanies.” She answered, pulling away.

 

“Is that why you ran away? Wait, you actually love me. I have a hard enough time believing he actually likes me.” James said, gesturing to him.

 

“What did you think that I was just tolerating your presence because I love Spock and he loves you? If you say ‘Vulcans don’t love’ I will never blow you again.” Considering her facial expressions, Spock believes she is entirely serious.

 

“I do not intend to.”

 

“Smart man because I’m really looking forward to watching.” James voices low, sensuous and filled with promise. Spock finds such a prospect arousing.

 

“I may let you, later.” She said, giving James another quick kiss. “I got a text message from our wonderful Admiral Pike telling me not to come back to the Academy after this morning session, so I have time. Apparently, you have already warmed him up for me.” He was tempted to remind her that James has not been cleared to participate in such strenuous activities, because Spock knows James well enough that he will not merely observe. Due to the fact her mouth was now on top of his and she was kissing him vigorously Spock chose not to raise this argument.

 

“We got the same message which means I have plenty of time to watch, even if I’m not allowed to participate.” James said with a pout.

 

“You may want to check your email for a special message from Doctor McCoy. However, we need to talk first.” She said pulling away from Spock.

 

“I hate those words.” James mumbled under breath. Spock agreed with his boyfriend completely.

 

To be continued

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I considered, including the three of them talking about everything in this chapter, but I felt it would make the chapter way too long. I’m planning on doing sexy times in the next chapter. I’m going to need your reviews to try to talk me into it. I’m not sure how far I am going to go but chances are there will be two different versions of the next chapter. There is also a 50-50 chance that will be the last chapter of this story. However, I have ideas for at least three more stories after this section, if there is interest.
> 
> *This was mentioned a few chapters ago, but I thought I would remind everybody that Nyota’s father left Starfleet when she was a small child for a nonprofit that is trying to bring about intergalactic peace.


	8. Why Do I Have a Feeling That Pizza Is A Euphemism For Something Else

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Congratulations, you have finally reached the sex chapter. You’re probably wondering why this is practically the last chapter in a book about polyandry relationships. That’s because this is a book about relationships. You don’t need sex to have a good relationship and you don’t need a relationship to have sex. However, I hope you come to the point in your life where you realize that a good relationship can make the worst sex in the world better.
> 
> Chapter 17 of The Idiot’s Guide to Multi-species Polyamorous Relationships, revised fifth edition

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everybody who read or reviewed the last chapter. This is not the final chapter, because it sort of got out of control and once I got to the 6,000 word plus mark, I knew I would need to split it into two.
> 
> Do not read this chapter at work (or on the bus around small children).
> 
> This chapter is about sex. It’s also about relationships, but it’s mainly about sex. However, there is not as much actual sex in this chapter as I originally hoped for, but there is sexual content. There is enough that I did not dare work on this chapter at work. Also, because it’s important to the plot, I decided to raise the overall rating of the version on fanfiction.net rather than create two versions.

Jim’s eyes literally started to glaze over as he sat there on the very comfy couch reading Bones' very detailed email about sex after extreme irradiation. The best thing about the email was his grumpy doctor friend finally gave him permission to start engaging in such activities again, even if it came with a list of instructions and tips. 

Jim loves Bones like the brother he wished he had, but this was too much. There was line after line about dry orgasms, orgasm intensity, and decreased semen production. He was half tempted to just give the letter to Spock, so he could read over the research articles that Bones sent links for. Spock would have so much fun reading that later, because science and sex are like his two favorite things. 

The importance of using contraceptives was mentioned multiple times because they don’t know what effects the radiation and Bones' special radiation treatment had on his sperm (or anything else produced by his body, for that matter). The words ‘birth defects’ were underlined multiple times to make a point. Really, this doesn’t surprise Jim, considering Nyota’s bag of goodies contained a jumbo family pack of old-fashioned condoms (in multiple flavors) along with equal part spermicide and lube (strawberry bubblegum). 

He rarely used condoms anymore because he was on the birth control shot and had received all his STI vaccinations and, contrary to popular belief, he was not that big of a slut and usually avoided the more high risk situations. However, Bones wanted him to go old school for a little while. For all they knew, the super blood could have canceled out all his vaccinations, but considering he was having monogamous-ish sex, it wasn't a big deal. Both of his partners were clean and Nyota was on the shot herself. Except, what they used to bring him back was in his blood and in his other fluids and they didn’t exactly know how said fluids would affect his partners, which meant old-fashioned condoms for at least the next six months.

Okay, they really didn’t know what the special radiation treatment did to his body in general. He's no longer allergic to half the stuff he was before the warp core incident. He’s been eating strawberry yogurt every day now that it no longer causes Jim to break out in hives. At the same time, he’s developed a bunch of new allergies, which was how he ended up in the hospital from one kiss. It would just be his luck that he developed an allergy to sperm.* 

He was normally an 'act first, end up in sickbay later' type of person, but he didsn’t want to deal with a worried Spock again. Worried Spock was scary as hell and when he came with worried Nyota, it was 10 times worse. Therefore, Jim was reading the entire letter carefully because if he ended up in the hospital after sex due to an allergic reaction or not following some obscure guidance from his doctor, he would never hear the end of it from Bones or his partners.

“Trust Bones to take the fun out of sex, now that he is allowing us to have it again,” he joked, putting the PADD down on the living room table. 

It was easier to make light of the situation than acknowledge how serious it really was. Because it wasn’t until he read Bones' words about dry orgasms and the after effects of radiation on the body that he realized that there could be long-term side effects of nearly dying. What was wrong with him? Watching footage of Spock freaking out when he was dying didn’t affect him the way the realization that his bedroom abilities may have suffered permanent damage. Now Jim wished that his doctor would’ve had this conversation with him when he issued the sex ban. He probably would have sent fewer inappropriate text messages asking for his sex privileges back if Bones had explained the reason why.

“I’m personally surprised that giving me my fun time privileges back did not come with the condition that Spock document everything we do in excruciating scientific detail.” Yes, he was using sarcasm to hide his fears. 

Because yes, his partners have patiently waited for him to get the all clear for sex, but what if -- he could no longer perform at the level he was accustomed to. For the last couple of weeks he’s been able to get it up even though he couldn’t really do anything, but that didn’t mean that half of Bones' dire warnings wouldn’t be true. Would they just leave him behind if he couldn’t live up to his supposed sex god reputation? 

“It would be prudent to document the effects that the radiation and the treatment Dr. McCoy used had on all aspects of your life, including your sexual health,” Spock said in the most matter of fact, Spock way possible. But underneath the apparently dry words, Jim could sense that Spock was worried about him.

 

“So you actually want to measure how many milliliters of cum I produce, when you finally make me let go?” Jim asked, as he looked over to see Spock’s eyes light up for him. 

“Do you have a science kink?” His mouth was millimeters from Spock’s neck as he whispered the words. Spock swallowed hard. Jim’s favorite game in the world was to unnerve Spock. In this moment he wasn’t worried about Bones' ominous warnings because he could still make Spock like this with just his words.

“I bet you’re already thinking about what techniques you would use. Oral would be fun, but manual would probably produce the most accurate results.” He could not help but suck on Spock’s neck at that point. It was just too tempting.

“Don’t ask questions you already know the answer to,” Nyota said with a roll of her eyes as she set out several bottles of liquor and wine along with a lot of shot glasses on the living room table. 

“Leonard’s only stipulation to allowing you to resume light sexual activities is that we talk to each other first about -- a lot of things. So let’s talk.”

Jim was pretty sure the reason why she ran out of therapy this morning was either because of ‘a lot of things’ or that thing they’re not talking about, his death. Considering the fact that Jim really did not accept what almost dying meant until he got the 'the no sex thing wasn’t just me cock blocking you' email from Bones, she was in really good company.

“What is light sex? One orgasm per eight hour period? No topping? Or is it ‘lie there and think of the Federation’ sex?” he said, pulling her down onto his lap. Okay, she was currently half on top of him and half on top of Spock.

“I think he just doesn’t want you to overexert yourself, which means just sit there and let us have fun.” To emphasize her point, she grabbed him and gave him a squeeze. At this point he was really wishing he was not wearing his Starfleet uniform pants. Why had he not change when they arrived? He had been too busy making out with Spock.

“In other words, we are going to have fun, but no sex marathons. You did just d…” She stopped there. It was obvious that Nyota couldn’t bring herself to say that he had died. 

“I thought we could play Truth in Wine,” she whispered huskily in his ear. Before he could ask why they were doing a drinking game, she kissed him in a way that made him think this might be a good idea. At the very least, it explained all the alcohol on the table. 

“I haven’t played that since I lived in some shady apartment with creepy frat boy roommate number three,” he said, once Nyota pulled away and higher brain functions returned. Spock didn’t have time to ask details (or state that this was crazy) because Nyota was already attacking his mouth with equal force. He loved watching them kiss a little too much. 

On a positive note, between watching his boyfriend and girlfriend make out and said girlfriend wiggling on his lap, he had just achieved his fastest erection since puberty. Good to know the warp core incident did not take that away.

“Please tell me we're playing the strip version?” Okay, Bones’ little email about sex post-incident may have dampened his enthusiasm a little (or induced a slight panic) but he still wanted to see everybody naked. That would be the only thing that would make the scene in front of him better. He really did love shirtless Spock and red lace Nyota.

“What is Truth in Wine?” Spock asked, as if he had not just engaged in a heated kiss with his girlfriend that would have left a normal man panting and unable to string two words together, let alone a question.

“It’s some hybrid between Truth or Dare and I Never,” Nyota explained just as Jim pulled Spock over for his own quick kiss. He could actually taste Nyota’s raspberry lip gloss on Spock’s lips.

“Basically somebody will ask you a question. If you tell the truth, you take a drink of wine. If you don’t want to answer the question you take a shot of something harder, or if you’re really adventurous, Truth Tea. The theory is that the longer you play, the harder it is for you to not let things slip. However, with Jim’s allergies I think we will just stick to Jack or Bailey’s,” Nyota elaborated after Spock gave her the look, even though he was making out with Jim at the time. Spock was just that skilled. 

Considering his system was all messed up from everything, he wasn't going to experiment with alien ‘herbs’ that make you confess your deepest dark secrets, even if they are legal (for therapeutic reasons anyway, if not for recreational use, except on New Vulcan and the Planet of the Tourist Trap). Also, he would really like this relationship to last past this evening and he didn’t want to blurt out anything overly embarrassing,

“What is ‘I Never’?” Spock asked, pulling away from Jim’s mouth, which was only slightly surprising because Spock was able to pay attention to Nyota while they were kissing. Jim knew he would ask about something, but he was expecting his boyfriend to ask about the Truth Tea. But then he remembered that Spock grew up on a planet where Truth Tea was served at Starbucks and had lived in this posh place the entire time he was at the Academy. Spock obviously missed out on some of the more formative Academy experiences.

“I’ll explain later,” he said, giving Spock another quick peck before turning his attentions to Nyota. “Never explain a drinking game with another drinking game to a guy who never lived at the Academy. Now we have to play just to educate him.” Just as he pulled Nyota to him for lip gloss tasting privileges, he realized that this game would be really hard to play with somebody who can’t get drunk (and who is immune to most of the effects of Truth Tea) and someone who is under doctor's orders not to drink.

“Wait, how are we going to play this game with alcohol, anyway? Spock can’t get drunk and I’m not supposed to drink. Please tell me we're playing the strip version.” Okay, that last part may have come out as begging.

“In addition to getting your orgasm privileges back,” she said, pushing hard against Jim as she spoke, “Leonard said that you can have some alcohol. After two shots, I’m switching you to the chocolate concoction that I’m giving Spock. Besides, I’m the one who’s going to need the alcohol to get through this conversation.” That statement worried him. 

He remembered seeing her get completely wasted after the 'almost Spock breakup' last year. Honestly, if that idiot had waited an hour, she would’ve been completely out of it without him putting a date rape drug in her drink.

“What do you not want to talk about without getting completely wasted?” Instead of actually answering his question, she downed an entire shot of Jack Daniels.

“See, the game is working already,” Nyota said as she placed the glass back on the table. The whole thing made Jim wonder if they should have played with the Truth Tea after all. It was kind of surprising for Jim to find out that as much as she criticized Spock for not doing it, Nyota was extremely horrible at sharing her feelings.

“What is the purpose of this game when we will just avoid asking questions that we do not want to address?” Trust Spock to ask the question that Jim was already thinking.

“I agree with Spock. Knowing us, we are mostly going to ask questions about favorite colors instead of the important questions like why we can’t talk about me dying without stuttering or changing the subject. I’m the one who died and I am the only one who can say the words out loud.” Okay, he hadn’t meant to say that, but somebody had to speak the truth.

“See, you already mentioned the elephant in the room without actually drinking. Have some wine,” she said, passing him a glass of wine as she kissed him on the cheek. He took a small drink just to make sure it would not cause his tongue to go blotchy (because an alcohol allergy would be just as bad as a sperm allergy). Thankfully he didn’t become blotchy.

“There is no elephant in the room.” And he took another long drink after Spock’s words, because he was going to need the alcohol. It was never a good sign when Spock played dumb. It meant Spock’s metaphorical defense shields were now up as if he were going up against the Klingons.

“Why do you pretend not to understand human colloquialisms when you’re a language expert? You may not know as many languages as I do, but you taught so many language classes at the Academy that I had to specialize in Klingon and Romulan, just to avoid a conflict.” Bless Nyota’s beautiful little heart for asking exactly what Jim was thinking.

“I discovered that if I appear to lack knowledge in a particular area, it puts others at ease and it is easier for him or her to work with me.” Both he and Nyota decided to reward Spock with a kiss. There was some bumping of noses, but they were starting to get the hang of three-way kissing.

“I have answered the question truthfully. Do I drink the wine or the chocolate milk?” Spock actually asked as he pulled away from the two very reluctantly. Spock was obviously making an effort because he knew this silly game might be their only chance to get Nyota to actually talk about anything.

“Chocolate milk,” both said simultaneously, which resulted in way too much giggling.

“Or you could just take off your shirt. I'd rather play the strip version,” Jim said, actually grabbing the edge of Spock’s shirt before Ny swatted his hand away.

“If we’re playing the strip version, you only start taking your clothes off if you don’t answer the question,” she said with a roll of her eyes.

“You know my stance on sleeping with drunk people. I'd rather start taking clothes off,” Jim pouted at her.

“Of course you would,” Nyoya snorted.

“What is your stance on engaging in intercourse with the inebriated?” Spock asked, and Jim wondered if Spock knew about that particular incident.

“Do you want to tell Spock about what happened during your almost breakup last year, or should I?” Jim asked, rubbing his temple.

“Since I was unconscious for half the night, I think this is your question. I already told him what I remembered,” Nyota said as she took a piece of Spock’s zucchini from the table. 

And that’s how they ended up playing the strip version of Truth in Wine. Nyota lost her shirt literally when she refused to answer if she was disappointed to find out they didn’t have sex that night. Jim fell just a little bit more in love with her because she could have just taken off a sock, but didn’t. She was wearing red lace, which was his absolute favorite.

Jim was still sober, because he had only consumed about a glass of wine during the game so far. He was also mostly dressed because, unlike his girlfriend, he had no trouble answering really uncomfortable questions such as anything related to his multiple near-death experiences (birth in the neutral zone, the cliff incident, getting practically beaten to death by stepfather number one after the cliff incident, Tarsus, almost getting beaten to death by a woman’s abusive husband, getting strangled by Romulans, and finally the warp core incident). It was also easy for him to answer questions about his very dysfunctional family. Most of the “good” stuff, that wasn't classified, was pretty much public record, and considering the two had talked to Sam directly when he did not visit Jim during his “recovery,” they already knew the worst of his Sam problems. 

However, he did lose his shirt when he didn’t answer the question about why he hasn’t been to see his mom since not dying. He was happy to lose his shirt just because Nyota did not stutter when she said the D word during her question.

Spock was also doing pretty well, although he was starting to get a little Vulcan tipsy. He was also shirtless right now after refusing to answer a question about Sarek’s reaction to being bonded to Jim and their poly relationship. (Actually, he did answer the question by stating that he could not answer the question because his father did not have a reaction because Spock had yet to inform him of the change in their relationship.) 

He lost his shirt because he refused to answer Jim’s follow-up question of why he had yet to talk to his father. This resulted in Nyota being really upset at Spock, because she’d had to deal with angry phone calls from her dad, while Spock did not yet have the balls to tell his dad. She lost her skirt when she refused to tell Spock and Jim exactly what her father said to her.

If they were playing the alcohol version of this game, his extremely tiny (she only weighs like 50 kg) girlfriend would probably be in the hospital for alcohol poisoning by this point. She was currently in only her bra and panties and that’s only because they gave her a free pass on not answering any question related to his death. In addition to that, Nyota did not want to talk about anything related to her parents, their divorce, Tiffany Bailey, and the nasty things that some of the crew say about her behind her back when they don’t think she’s in listening distance. Jim was learning a lot more about her by what she didn’t want to talk about than what she did.

“Okay, this is not working,” Jim said after Nyota was about to lose her bra, because she did not want to answer a question about why she ran out of therapy. “Please keep your bra on.”

“Are you saying that you don’t want me to remove more clothing?” she asked incredulously.

“Well, your breasts look especially perky in that,” he joked before getting serious, “I’m saying that the whole purpose of this exercise is for us to actually talk to each other. So far I’ve learned that you’re perfectly okay with the fact that Spock and I are bonded, you don’t want to have children until you’re ready to take a planet based job, and your father said something to you that probably warrants punching him out, but you won’t tell me what that thing is,” Jim told her, slightly annoyed. He wanted to know if his future father-in-law-- he meant his girlfriend’s father, was angry enough to hire a hitman to take him out.

“Also, by your lack of candor, we are also aware of that you find the events surrounding James' death disconcerting,” Spock added.

“So do you. Would you like to talk about why you woke up suddenly three nights ago and couldn’t go back to sleep? Or would you prefer to talk about anything going on in your head whatsoever?” Nyota asked somewhat defensivly. 

Spock responded by taking off his pants. Well, at least Spock was enjoying this as much as he was, physically, anyway. Starfleet issued briefs are very constricting.

“As much as I enjoy the fact that both of you are now in your underwear, we are not really talking about what we need to talk about. Apparently, the strip version of the game also doesn’t work when you’re more comfortable being naked in front of the people you’re playing with, than talking about anything. I hate it when Bones is right,” Jim said, finishing off his current glass of wine. 

“It’s never a good sign when I am the person most comfortable sharing my feelings. It’s really not a good sign when he is the second most comfortable. There are days when I’m not even sure Spock acknowledges that he has any feelings whatsoever.” That joke got him the Spock angry eyebrows of death that managed to make a certain part of his anatomy go down a little bit.

“Just because I am not overly demonstrative…” Spock started, but Jim cut them off with a quick kiss on the mouth.

“Trust me, Spock, after I watched you cry in front of me, I figured it out. I know you actually care.” Spock responded by kissing him again. He was really starting to enjoy the dexterity of the Vulcan tongue. All those really strange Vulcan words that were absolutely impossible for Jim to pronounce (including his boyfriend’s complete name) had to be good for something.

“I’m already down to my panties; can’t we just have sex now?” As she asked the question, her fingers were already unbuttoning his pants.

“And this is why I love you,” Jim said as he reluctantly, very reluctantly, pushed her hands away. “The whole point of this activity is for us to talk. So far, the only thing we have learned is that despite me being exposed to vast quantities of radiation during that thing you do not want to talk about, I can still get an erection.”

“I know. It’s been poking me in the ass for the last 35 minutes. I can do something about that,” she said, actually reaching over for him, but he pushed her very eager hands away. He didn’t know how, but Jim exercised more self-control than anyone ever thought he could. 

Kim is a dick, but unfortunately the guy was right. He can’t sleep with her, or Spock for that matter, until they have talked everything out, or at the very least start talking about the ‘I died in the warp core’ elephant in the room. Considering even he doesn’t really want to talk about it, this could take a while.

“So as much as it pains me to say this, no sex until we at least know why you ran out of your therapy session,” Jim said, using his Captain voice normally reserved for bloodthirsty Klingons and 20th century megalomaniac nut jobs.

“Doctor Kim is a dick?” She phrased it more like a question than anything else. “Now, can I demonstrate my excellent oral skills? I did get raspberry condoms for a reason.” Spock actually swallowed hard in the background and he wasn’t the one who was having a very luscious backside rubbing into his erection. They were both equally screwed by all definitions of the term.

“Okay, if you want to play that game, we'll play,” he said, looking directly at Spock, telling him it was now time to give her a taste of her own medicine. This was going to be fun.

xxxx.  
Okay, she really thought that this drinking game would have been more productive. Okay, it probably would’ve been more productive if Jim would actually let her drink something harder than wine. But after Jim’s ‘I don’t like to have sex with drunk people because the lizard girl incident wasn’t the first time I ended up chained to furniture after making a bad inebriated hook up decision’ confession, she couldn’t do that to him. 

The game was going especially well for Jim, because she was now sitting in her bra and panties on his lap, with her legs sprawled on top of Spock. She knew she wasn’t going to confess anything without being completely drunk, but she didn’t want to make Jim uncomfortable. 

She hated talking about her dad and she really hated talking about Jim dying. She wanted to leave the room immediately when he started talking so casually about all his other near-death experiences. (She was beyond pissed when she found out that Spock had not told his father about his accidental Vulcan almost-marriage to Jim). 

She really couldn’t take any more, especially with Jim digging into her backside and Spock rubbing lazy circles along her naked legs. That’s when she decided to give up and just unzip Jim’s pants. She had made a good-faith effort to talk about this and she was really tired of being poked.

Jim was apparently more afraid of the wrath of his best friend than she was and decided to change tactics. This was why Spock’s hands were moving deliberately toward her very wet panties and Jim’s mouth was pressed up against her throat.

“I think you need an incentive to actually answer our questions. If you answer the questions, you get a reward,” Jim said, caressing her right breast with his hand, just as Spock attacked the scrap of fabric between her thighs. Those were going in the trash after this.

“I completely agree that Kim is and will always be a dick who has a tendency to say things you don’t want to hear but need to hear anyway. Did he say anything like 'I don’t care about you' or that I’m only putting up with you just for Spock?” he asked as he looked her directly in the eyes. 

“Let me tell you, that is absolute bull…” She kissed mid-curse-word because she knew exactly what he was going to say and he deserved a kiss for that.

“Doctor Kim didn’t say anything like that,” she said, pulling away from his swollen lips. A part of her wanted to tell Jim and Spock that it was Tiffany Bailey and Daddy Dearest saying stupid stuff like that, but the words just wouldn’t come out.

“What did he say?” Jim asked in the calmest voice imaginable.

“Shouldn’t you be asking Spock questions as well?” she asked, which resulted in Jim pulling away from her and Spock stopping his hand movement.

“Do you want to watch me torture him instead?” he whispered against her mouth, lips, not quite touching. “Do you want to watch me take one of those beautiful green nipples into my mouth and just suck, or do you want me to suck on something else?” 

It was moments like these that made her realize why the man beneath her was one of the most brilliant tactical minds in Starfleet, especially because one of her lace covered nipples was now in his mouth and he was sucking hard. He would get her to confess everything if she were not careful. It was time for evasive maneuvers.

“You’re supposed to be taking it easy,” she told him, pulling away this time, not even sure how her brain was functioning enough to form words, let alone think to grab the bottle of lubricant and condoms from under the coffee table. “Did you know that Spock can come just by fingering you? Vulcan fingers really are that sensitive,” she said, just as she threw the supplies to Spock.

“Well, I could just switch places with you and find out how sensitive those fingers really are for myself.” His hand was now between her legs too, but he wasn't touching her the way she wanted him to. 

“Although, that still leaves his mouth to be occupied.” That’s when Jim’s mouth went back to her breasts. “I can just sit back here and order him to suck on these gorgeous tits of yours while he finger fucks me, until you tell me exactly why you left Doctor Kim. You know Spock is an excellent multitasker. He could bring us both off simultaneously,” Jim mumbled against her chest, but he didn’t start sucking again. He just kissed a fabric covered nipple instead. 

At this point, one of Spock’s hands was caressing her other breast. The other hand was reserved for torturing Jim. They were not even talking out loud, but giving each other those looks. She knew they were talking to each other without words. She’d seen them communicate like this in a battle before, but it was kind of dangerous like this. They were killing her.

“Do you actually want me? Do you see me as just something you have to deal with to get with Spock?” Jim asked. Until he asked that question, she hadn’t realized that people would be saying the same stupid stuff to him. In a way, it might be worse for him because she and Spock had been together first. Her only response was to kiss him again. She tried to tell him without words that, yes, she really did care about him.

“I think we had this conversation earlier, but in case you forgot in the last hour, I’m in love with both of you. Is that what you think? I told you already that I’m okay that you and Spock are bonded. I’m not jealous,” she stated.

“You’re not the only one hearing stupid things from stupid people. And unfortunately, if you hear something enough you start to think that maybe it is true and maybe you’re not okay that I somehow accidentally married your boyfriend when you were dating, sort of.” Jim is babbling a little. Okay, he’s babbling a lot and she’s not sure a kiss this time will get him to shut up.

“I really am okay with the fact that you guys are bonded. It makes a lot of things easier if it turns out to be a universal constant that Spock and I cannot bond in the Vulcan tradition. But I don’t think anyone else sees it that way.”

“Well, you can just tell Tiffany Bailey to go fuck herself,” Jim said as he placed a kiss on her collar bone. 

“My father thinks I’m deluding myself. He thinks that this whole arrangement is just an excuse to let my boyfriend cheat on me. He is convinced that in three or four years, I’m going to be crying on his couch because my husband left me for his boyfriend.”

“I do not find your father’s hypothesis logical at all. Vulcans do not get divorced,” Spock told her as he continued to lovingly caress her breasts. Her response was to laugh at Spock’s words.

“Spock, I realize how ridiculous what he said is. Especially because you’re sort of married, by Vulcan standards, to someone else. I’m not jealous of what you two have. I’m upset because I’m actually relieved that you two are already bonded, but I didn’t want to tell you.”  
Okay, yes, the sexual torture got her to confess. She was rewarded with one of Jim’s fingers finally slipping inside her. He was really talented with his fingers.

“Okay, why are you relieved?” Jim asked just as his fingers stopped stroking her.

“I don’t want to get married or bonded or anything like that. I’m not a white picket fence type person,” she confessed and Jim’s hands started moving again.

“I don’t think I am either, but here I am,” he whispered against her.

“I think you’re that way because you never expected to get more. You grew up watching your mom be screwed over by complete bastards, so of course you are going to be wary, but you’re happy right now. This is what you want, you want us.” Of course, when she tells him this, she’s panting a little because Jim’s hands really are that good and Spock’s mouth is now occupied with Jim’s suggestion from earlier. Maybe it’s good that his mouth is otherwise occupied.

“The bonding is not something you want?” Jim asked as his hand stopped moving inside of her and her only response was, “yes”. 

“You never told me that,” Spock said as he pulled away from her abruptly. She couldn’t bring herself to look at him because she knew that her words had hurt him profoundly. “You are aware that bonding is…” She stopped him by grabbing his hand and bringing his fingertips to her lips.

“It wasn’t like I was going to let you die. I love you too much for that. I would’ve gone through with it for you, or at least try to, but according to…” 

“Maybe it didn’t work for them, because Other You didn’t want to be tied down to anybody,” Jim supplied, very annoyed and seconds away from pulling away from her completely.

“That’s not-- my parents promised until death do us part and it didn’t last anywhere near that long. They were wrong for each other. They never talked. Although, in their defense, they weren’t even in the same solar system 95% of the time,” she told her boyfriends, trying to explain why she has such a problem with marriage.

“My parents had a similar situation. Yet their marriage survived until my mother’s death,” Spock said, rebuking her argument. He was also no longer touching any of her fun places.

“Because I bet your mom talked to your father every single night no matter what planet he was visiting. When I was three or four, I realized that the only reason why my parents were still together was because of some piece of paper and me. I already knew it wasn’t going to last much longer. Unfortunately, a few years later, they proved me right.” She was on the verge of tears at that point, and they were not tears of the sexual frustration variety. 

“I don’t want the person or, in this case, persons that I am in love with to just stay with me out of some misplaced obligation to a piece of paper. I want you to choose me every single day. I want…” She was in tears as she felt Jim’s arms wrap around her. She also felt Spock kiss her neck as he intertwined their fingers together.

“I guess that’s where you and I differ. You see it as some obligation and I see it as just putting a promise in writing.” Jim forced her to look at him as he continued speaking. 

“You’re not something that I am dealing with just because I want to be with Spock.” She felt his mouth on hers and it seemed like he was trying to tell her that he loved her too with every movement. He pulled away, just long enough for his mouth to be replaced with Spock’s, and it seemed like he was trying to tell her the exact same thing.

“I still care for you, even though I developed feelings for James. I love both of you.” She was kind of shocked. Spock didn’t say that word at all. She wasn't even 100% sure it was actually in his vocabulary.

“It only took you four years to say it,” she quipped as she pulled him back into another kiss.

“I was going to take you to Vulcan after graduation,” Spock mumbled against her lips.

“I remember,” she said, giving him a sad smile as Jim squeezed Spock’s hand. “It was supposed to be the big 'meet the family' thing now that we didn’t have to worry about the appearance of impropriety.” He had planned that trip for months. In a special folder on her PADD she kept every email related to that trip, including the ridiculous email where the travel agency apologized for their trip being canceled due to ‘catastrophic mishap’, but still refusing to give back the deposit.

“I was going to approach my father regarding the possibility of us bonding. I did not and still do not want to bond with you merely because it’s logical due to biological necessity, but because of my regard for you. I do not envision that changing from one day to the next,” he said, trying to reassure her.

“But it did change.” Spock looked like he was about to speak and so did Jim, so she silenced both men by pressing a finger to their lips. “Don’t argue with me right now. It’s different now and it is because of Jim, but not the way my father thinks. A year ago, you wouldn’t have said that you love me, even though I knew that you did. I think Jim has been a good influence on you.”

“I don’t think I heard the word love in relation to myself until you guys,” Jim confessed in a whisper.

“Get used to it. I told you that I love you,” she said, reaching back to kiss him on the mouth. She loved his taste. 

“Please tell me that we have satisfied your sadistic best friend’s quota for talking about our feelings before sex, because I can’t take any more of this teasing that you two have been doing. We don’t have to work everything out tonight. It’s not like I’m planning on leaving in the middle of the night.”

“That is fortunate because I have plans for both of you.” She wasn't exactly sure which boyfriend removed her bra as soon as Spock stopped talking, but considering there was a mouth on each nipple, she really didn’t care. Actually, she really wasn’t thinking that much at that point. But at least they remembered that Jim actually needed to use a condom before she sank down on top of him (no dry orgasms there). The couch was so going to need to be cleaned, but that was Spock’s fault.

To be continued

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Theoretically the next chapter is supposed to be short, but you’re talking to a woman who wrote a 50,000 word 5+1. My definition of ‘short’ is highly subjective.  
> *Yes, there have been recorded cases of an actual allergy to semen. It’s rare, but it does happen.


	9. Part nine: Maybe Pizza Wasn’t Necessary, Anyway

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Loving someone (or in this case loving more than one someone) doesn’t solve all of your problems, but it’s a good place to start. 
> 
> Chapter 18 of The Idiot’s Guide to Multi-species Polyamorous Relationships, revised fifth edition

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everybody who read or reviewed the last chapter. Your reviews were very helpful because I hate writing scenes of an erotic nature. However, thanks to your encouragement, there probably will be more sex in the later stories in the series. There may even be some fun stuff in this chapter.
> 
> This is the last section in this story. However, as I stated above, there will be more stories. I have plans for at least three more stories in this series.   
> In the meantime, I would like to thank everybody who has left kudos, bookmarked this story, added the story to your alerts, or added it to your favorites. I know it’s not always feasible to leave review, but I appreciate any little bit of encouragement you have given me. It keeps me writing.

“Oh god, we are going to have to clean the couch.” Spock heard Nyota said as he walked back into the living room after successfully depositing James on the bed without waking him.

 

If he were human, Spock would be proud of the fact that Nyota and he were able to render James unconscious post orgasm. However, his logical Vulcan side reminded him that James’ reaction was most likely caused by his lack of sleep.

 

“Why does the couch need to be cleaned?” Spock asked as he quickly kissed her on the lips. He would be disappointed that she was dressed again, if not for the fact that she was only wearing James’ discarded shirt. Their partner’s scent mixed with her own was highly intoxicating.

 

“Because there is now a giant wet spot in the middle of it, which is entirely your fault,” she pointed to the couch that was covered with strawberry lubricant, among other things.

 

“You were the one who jumped on James before we could relocate…” He was cut off by her mouth descending on his before he could say the word bedroom or mention that she was the one who accidentally sat on the tube of lubricant during their activities.

 

“Because I spent 40 minutes being teased by both of you and I couldn’t wait that long.” Due to the fact that she was playing with the drawstring of his sleep pants, he doubted there was any malice behind her words.

 

“I believe what we were doing is considered foreplay not teasing, especially in light of the fact you attained orgasm twice.” His words were punctuated with another kiss.

 

“Yes and you managed to prove that you can get off just by finger fucking Jim.” She said as she stroked his hand, which is why he did not correct her by reminding Nyota that he received other stimulation from James.

 

“James was not the only one I was stimulating digitally.” He whispered against her neck instead, as he started to suck gently.

 

“I think we better move this to the bedroom.” She said pulling away. “If we keep this up, we are going to damage more furniture and possibly the carpet.”

 

“That would not necessarily be problematic. A lot of the furniture and decorations in this house was chosen by my mother…” He started to say, but was interrupted again by his girlfriend.

 

“Which is why I want to clean the couch not get rid of it, in addition to not causing more damage. Although, I’m sure we are never going to be able to sit on this couch again without giggling or blushing.” She told him, smirking.

 

“Vulcans do not blush.” He responded automatically.

 

“Your cheeks looked very green when Jim wrapped…” Spock stopped her there with a touch of his fingers to her lips.

 

“What I mean is, as things stand, this house still appears as if it belongs to my parents not us.” Spock voiced something that has been on his mind for many months. It was obvious that their bedroom belong to the trio, but the rest of the loft did not reflect the personality of himself or his lovers.

 

“I think we should try to make this our home. When my father comes for the dedication of the Memorial to honor those who lost their lives during the Battle of Vulcan, we should allow him to take most of the furniture with him to his new apartment on the colony. Then we can choose things that are more our taste.” There were some things that Spock would keep, but his father would appreciate having some of Amanda’s things with him.

 

“Yes, but not the couch. We can’t give your father a couch that we had sex on.” She joked as she kissed him again.

 

“By that logic, we cannot give him the kitchen table either.” Spock quipped.

 

“I like that table and I’m sure Jim will too, as soon as he is ready for kitchen sex.” She smirked at him. “You know letting me pick out new furniture is not going to convince me that someday this is not all going to fall apart.” Nyota accused.

 

Maybe her allegation was not completely false. Spock wanted to prove to her by any means necessary that his affections for her were genuine and he was not planning on leaving her behind if he became bored. He loved her and he needed her to understand that was not going to change even if he also loves James.

 

“It is illogical to promise that nothing will go wrong, especially because it already has. You practically sacrificed yourself to the Volcano in the name of the Prime Directive and Jim died trying to save all of us.”

 

“Should I reward you with a kiss for saying that without stuttering?” Spock asked, realizing how hard it was for her to tell him that.

 

“That would be nice.” She said pulling him towards her one more time. “Although, I think what would really make me feel better is to know why you haven’t told your father about our mutual new boyfriend, who you just happen to be married to sort of by Vulcan standards?”

 

“It is more like an engagement.” She just rolled her eyes at his response.

 

“We’re not arguing semantics right now. Were you waiting to tell your father in person or did you neglected tell him because you were afraid of his reaction?” Nyota asked pointedly.

 

“It was a combination of the two possibilities. I was uncertain of his reaction and I felt it was better to wait until I had a chance to do so in person.” Spock confided in her.

 

“And the fact that he will be here for the dedication gives you an opportunity to break the news gently. You don’t think he’s going to like Jim?”

 

“The first time he met James, I was trying to kill him.” Spock told her trying to articulate just how worried he was about his father’s reaction.

 

“Looking back on that now, I think that was you two trying erotic asphyxiation without a safe word.” She smirked at him, but still gave Spock a sympathetic squeeze of his hand. It is obvious to Spock that she does understand his fears.

 

“I do not think my father would find such a possibility comforting.” Spock said without inflection.

 

“Which is why we will never ever give him the couch,” she joked before looking thoughtful.

 

“Jim grows on people after a while. I’m sure your father will like him. Besides, from what you told me, your father likes strong-minded humans.” Just as she said these words, they heard a communicator go off somewhere in the house. Apparently, it was James communicator which managed to land somewhere outside the hallway of the bedroom. Spock is certain he was the one who most likely threw it that far. He is surprised it is still functional.

 

“If that’s my so-called evil best friend calling to find out if I ejaculated, I’m going to kill him.” James said from their bedroom, easily woken up by the communicator. He knows James is a light sleeper, because disasters on starships rarely happened during normal working hours and as Captain James would have to be ready at a moment’s notice to take charge.

 

“Voicemail was created for a reason.” Nyota said, picking up the device to silence it before they continued on to the bedroom.

 

“I’m all for that. I’m cold and alone. Also apparently somebody didn’t even bother to dress me. Must want easy access,” from the tone, Spock could tell James was trying to be seductive.

 

“You know with lines like that I’m shocked you ever got laid.” Nyota said as she sat on the bed beside James.

 

“It must be my winning personality.” He said as he leaned in to kiss her, but they were interrupted by Spock’s communicator going off this time.

 

“No. Voicemail. Round two now. The bed needs to be christened.” Spock agrees with her and did not accept the call. Seconds later, the device started chirping again.

 

“Okay, give me that.” James said, barely taking a moment to look at the caller ID before snatching the device out of Spock’s hands.

 

“God damn it Bones, after weeks of being a good little boy and not fucking my boyfriend and girlfriend because of medical reasons that you didn’t even bother to explain to me, I’m finally doing just that. Actually, I’m in the middle of it. I still have Spock to Fuck or maybe the other way around. I’m not pic…” At that moment, James face fell and his cheeks became crimson.

 

“Hello, Admiral Chan.” As soon as James said the name, he placed his head in his hands. His boyfriend just told a very high ranking Starfleet official about their sex life. Spock’s cheeks were becoming slightly green at that point. Nyota responded with a glare directed at James.

 

“You’re still very young Admiral and I’m sorry, I completely forgot that all Starfleet calls show up as the same phone number via caller ID.” James is actually hiding under a pillow at that point. “No were not watching the news right now. We were…” Jim pauses as he activates the video screen in the bedroom and turns it to one of the 300 streaming news channels. This one was dedicated to all things Starfleet. On screen was an image of Admiral X being led out of Starfleet headquarters in restraints. The caption below read ‘Starfleet admiral arrested on suspicion of misappropriation of funds and sexual misconduct’.

 

“Yes in the middle of that. I’m turning it on right now and we will be at headquarters in an hour for that briefing.” James said as he ended the call. He was already up from the bed looking for a pair of pants.

 

“Okay, maybe we shouldn’t have let the earlier messages go to voicemail. Also did you know that whenever you call somebody from a Starfleet communicator, the number shows up exactly the same on someone’s private line?” Spock would have responded with the fact that is mentioned in the Starfleet orientation materials but he was too engrossed in what was happening on screen.

 

“Well, I see that they chose their scapegoat for the Vengeance Incident.” James said, not taking his eyes off the screen.

 

“I am uncertain if that term applies to someone who most likely committed the crimes that they are accused of.”

 

“Good point. Do you think that we have time for a shower?” James asked with a grin that was somewhat inappropriate considering the circumstances.

 

“Not together. For the sake of actual expediency, it would be most prudent that we each use one of the other three bathrooms in the apartment.” Spock told him.

“Don’t ever change.” James said, quickly kissing him on the lips before making his way to one of the other bathrooms in the apartment.

* * *

 

Jim absolutely hated Kim (in a professional capacity, anyway). It was the bastard’s fault that he was sitting in Dr. Caraballo’s office at 9 AM sharp, after about two hours of sleep. Maybe Jim would be okay with the sleep deprivation, if it was just fun sleep deprivation. Lack of sleep due to a sex marathon was good. Lack of sleep because you spent the entire night getting briefed and debriefed on Admiral X being arrested was very irritating. (Okay, so some of his exhaustion could be traced to sexual activities, but unfortunately not the majority of it.)

 

It really did take hours to go through everything during the briefing from hell. Jim already knew that X was a bad person, so he wasn’t expecting to learn much. In the back of Jim’s mind, he always knew that the man was responsible for his mother’s assignment on Tarsus and therefore indirectly responsible for her being institutionalized at a psychiatric facility that specializes in ‘treatment’ of retired Starfleet personnel (i.e. an institution where patients were tortured for Federation secrets or for just being from the Federation and never fully recovered). He says indirectly because he doesn’t even think that X could have arranged for the rape, torture, and famine that they had to deal with on the planet of the damned.

 

And yet, he discovered things that X did that made Jim think the man was the epitome of evil. It turns out that the London incident was engineered by X or at least the part where “John Harrison” decided to shoot up a conference room of Starfleet officials. Apparently, X allowed that bit of intel to leak to the “Starfleet operative” in the hope that the man would take out most of the Starfleet brass that were in his way.

 

Thankfully for all concerned, Admiral Chan had a personal emergency (her sister going into labor 30 minutes before the call) and therefore she didn’t even bother to show up to the conference room. Looking back on it now, the whole thing felt suspicious. Seriously, why they hell were they meeting in a conference room with an exterior wall? Jim also remembered that X didn’t show up until after Chris died.

 

There were more evil things that X was arrested for, but by that point, he broke a computer screen and Spock was sent to calm him down. So, the rumor about Jim receiving head in the Starfleet press room at HQ is now true even if it wasn’t at the time it was originally being circulated.

 

That little outburst was the other reason why he had no choice but to honor his therapy appointment. (He also now had an extra two months of mandatory sessions.) Okay, he may also be here because of what he said to Chan because of the little caller ID mishap. Dr. Caraballo found that story hilarious.

 

“Okay, now on to more serious things.” His therapist said as she tried to stop laughing, but she was doing a horrible job. “Doctor Kim suggested that we talk about-- actually Doctor Kim suggested that we talk about a lot of things.”

 

“That was unbelievably vague.” He rolled his eyes at her. “Although I’m sure somewhere along his laundry list he probably included my communications issues with my boyfriend and girlfriend.

 

“He may have mentioned something along those lines. He also mentioned that you’re all having trouble talking about your death.” Jim opened his mouth, in shock as soon as she said that. “Thanks to the Admiral that you referred to as X no longer being here, I now know what really happened.”

 

“I don’t want to talk about that right now.” Jim told her with a sigh.

 

 “That’s okay. Dr. Kim mentioned that you are having trouble talking to other people about pretty much anything in general and particularly the fact that you feel solely responsible for your mentor’s death.”

 

Kim is such a dick. Should a therapist be sharing this type of information? Is this even ethical?

 

“Well, it is, but in an entirely different way than I thought it was. According to a super secret briefing that had me up until about five this morning, X was probably more responsible for what happened then I was but…” He can’t even talk about it out loud. He’s already shaking at this point.

 

“Good thing for you I was already briefed. Do you want to talk about it? If you’re not ready, we can do it during another session.” She tells him gently.

 

“It may be many sessions from now before I’m willing to talk about X. The guy responsible for sending my mom to Tarsus because she wouldn’t sleep with him is in jail.  There’s also a pretty good chance that he manipulated things so the person who was the closest thing I’ve ever had to a father practically died in my arms, so he could take over. I don’t think I’ve completely comprehended what happened yet. I’m just not-- it’s still too fresh.” This was just another long line of things he isn’t ready to talk about. Spock did not force the issue in the bathroom. He didn’t even mention that Jim broke down in tears after he came during their encounter this morning.

 

“Okay,” she said, scribbling something in her PADD.

 

“Can we just talk about something happier like impending war with the Klingons?” Jim joked.

 

“The fact that you think that’s happier worries me.” She said with a deadpan expression that would rival Spock.

 

“Okay, my life isn’t that insane, I understand happy. Before I got called into Starfleet to hear all about the horrible things that X has done I was having fun, happy time. I’ve been very happy in the last 24 hours. Doctor McCoy finally lifted the sex restriction. Actually, I’ve had three happies in the last 24 hours.” He said with a smirk.

So after the little incident, Chan decided it was best if he spent a little time in the Starfleet HQ ‘guest rooms’ instead of going back to his apartment, which was now teaming with paparazzi, so he could get a few hours of sleep. The keyword there is ‘few’ and he did not exactly want to wake up. Therefore, Spock and Ny decided that wake-up sex was in order.

 

“Kim did mention that you equate sex with happiness.” Dr. Caraballo rolled her eyes.

 

“Kim is a dick. Really, I don’t know what I saw in him. Spock is much better at giving head.” Jim said with a smirk remembering Spock’s smile very fondly. “So is Nyota for that matter. I love her tongue. It would be so much better if we didn’t have to use condoms, but I guess that’s the consequence of dying.”

 

“Of course, there are going to be a lot of consequences. It wasn’t like it was eight seconds and you were revived. You were clinically dead for hours.” Actually, it may have been longer than that but no one will ever tell Jim the exact amount of time, not even Spock.

“I am talking about it with my partners. We actually talked about it a lot last night before things fell apart.

 

“I’m happy that you’re talking about it with someone. Was that the real reason why you were happy?” She asked thoughtfully.

 

“More like we sat down and talked about a lot of things. I guess I’m happy because I know now that Nyota actually loves me and she doesn’t see me as someone that she has to put up with in order to stay with Spock. Spock actually loves me.” He was literally grinning from ear to ear.

 

“That surprises you?” The doctor asked.

 

“I have serious issues. We have not really gotten into my family issues yet because my work issues have been much more prevalent, but I don’t always feel like I am lovable.” Jim confessed and thankfully the doctor stayed silent.

 

“I’m actually happy.  Even though there’s so much stuff I have to deal with, at least I don’t have to do it alone anymore.”

 

“I think that’s a good thing.” Dr. Caraballo smiled at him.

 

* * *

 

“How did your session go?” She asked James as soon as he walked through the door.

 

Because of everything that happened, Nyota was ordered to take a few personal days. Initially, her first year students were happy about this until she emailed their homework.

 

Rodriguez was right, she needed a few days to process. Yesterday’s revelations were hard on everyone. While Jim and Spock were busy making a certain ridiculous rumor true about office sex and the child of an ambassador, she got to find out about how the man manipulated Tiffany and his extensive history of sexually harassing her mother.

 

Because Jim had waited for her yesterday, she thought it would be best to do the same thing for Jim today. Although at least this time Spock was able to be with her. Because of X’s arrest yesterday, HQ believed the paparazzi were going to be as aggressive as they were during the first few days after the Vengeance incident, he was also asked to take a few ‘personal days’.

 

“I completely freaked her out with talk about our newly discovered incredible sex life.” Jim said smirking.

 

“The thing is I don’t think you’re joking,” she said with a shake of her head.

“I find James rarely jokes regarding anything of a sexual nature. However, I doubt that is the only thing you and Dr. Caraballo discussed.”

 

“We covered a lot of ground. She also likes my suggestion that we just get out of town for a couple of days. She says being followed by paparazzi is good for no one’s mental health.”

 

“I believe her hypothesis is correct.” Spock remarked.

 

“I know this great bed and breakfast that’s three hours away.” Jim suggested. “It’s in the desert, but they have great food, and it’s really secluded. It’s also near the rehabilitation center where Winona is. I figure that I can spend some time with Winona and you two can make good use of the pool or in Spock’s case, the meditation gardens.” It seemed more like he was describing a boutique hotel than a bed and breakfast, but it seemed like a good idea. There was just one part of his plan that she did not agree with.

 

“We are not going to wander the desert while you’re off dealing with family stuff. We will be there with you.” She said, remembering Jim’s apprehension from the day before. It was obvious that he would need their support. “This relationship is more than just sex.” She gave Jim a reassuring smile.

 

“We will support you in any way necessary.” Spock added.

 

“If we weren’t in public, I would so kiss both of you right now.” Jim said with another smile. “Thank you for being there for me. That means a lot to me. There’s so much stuff I have to talk to her about and I just didn’t want to do it alone.” That’s when she and Spock each grabbed one of Jim’s hands.

 

“They arrested the idiot last night; I think we can at least get away with handholding right now.” She said squeezing his hand harder. She wasn’t going to start making out with him in public, but she was definitely going to hold his hand. He needed her right now.

 

“As long as were cool with the paparazzi picking up everything. Also, I think what Spock is doing with my hand can get him arrested on Vulcan.” She looked down to see that, by Vulcan standards, Spock was being slightly obscene.

“That is impossible since there is no longer a Vulcan.” Spock quipped in response.

“You know what I-- you’re so frustrating.” Jim said with mock annoyance.

“He always has been, but at least it’s now two against one.” She smirked.

“I think I like those odds.” James grinned as they walked out the door to face the press together.

 

The end of part two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To be continued in The Idiots Guide to Family Bonding
> 
> Summary: They say that you cannot pick your family. Jim calls bullshit on that. 
> 
> Those who are reading this story on fanfiction.net, I will be posting the next story onto this one. You may want to consider signing up for alerts. On A3O, you can sign up for alerts on the series.  
> Because of some family things, I probably will not start on the next story until late May or early June at the earliest. Until then, there is always The Truth About Love and Dear James to keep you occupied.

**Author's Note:**

> Please review if you want more. Also please provide your suggestions for the perils of the three living together this early in the relationship. I have some idea already but I want to see if anybody has come up with anything I have not. I know I definitely have to do something with fighting over the temperature of the apartment.


End file.
